11 sentenced to death in Egypt over football tragedy

Cairo: An Egyptian court on Tuesday confirmed the death sentence against 11 defendants in a retrial on charges of complicity in the country’s worst football tragedy that left 74 fans dead more than three years ago.

The Cairo Criminal Court announced the verdict after receiving approval from the country’s top Islamic authority, the Grand Mufti, of the preliminary death sentences issued in April against the defendants.

Under Egyptian law, a non-binding opinion of the Grand Mufti must be sought in capital punishment cases.

When presiding judge Mohammad Al Saeed announced the death verdict, the convicts reacted angrily inside the defendants’ cage. Some of them slapped their cheeks while others banged against the iron bars of the cage.

The court also gave jail terms varying from 15 to three years in prison to 40 co-defendants. Four ex-policemen, including the former security chief of the Port Saeed city, where the tragedy had occurred, received five years in prison each.

The court acquitted 22 others in the same case, dubbed the “Massacre of the Port Saeed Stadium” in the local media.

All the rulings can be appealed.

Families of the defendants and victims were barred from attending Tuesday’s session held at a makeshift courtroom in the Police Academy on the outskirts of Cairo. The measure was meant to prevent a potential violent reaction inside the courtroom, security sources said.

Anti-riot police were meanwhile deployed outside the building and kept families of the victims and the accused apart.

The high-profile case is linked to the death of 74 people in a riot at the Port Saeed stadium in February 2012 following a match between the home team Al Masry and Egypt’s top squad Al Ahly.

The incident prompted Egyptian authorities to scrap the country’s Premier League that season.

In March 2013, a court sentenced to death 21 of the defendants in the case that sparked a massive riot in Port Saeed, prompting the then president Mohammad Mursi to impose a curfew in the city.

Last year, Egypt’s top appeals court ordered a retrial for all the defendants. The retrial began last August.

Should the appeals against the latest rulings be accepted, this would mark the final step in the legal process in the case.