The case of Khaled Saeed, the young man who was allegedly killed by police officers in Alexandria, captures the shifting relationship between security services and the Egyptian public.
The police’s denial of the charge and insistence on tarnishing the young man’s reputation, combined with growing public demands for a fair investigation, have prompted the attorney general to order a new autopsy and assign the case to another prosecutor.
This indicates a new balance of power between the security apparatus and the Egyptian street. If the mighty security services have the ability to know every detail about Egyptian citizens and are entitled by law to arrest anyone on suspicion, then citizens also possess equally important tools to expose the police’s crimes. They have mobile phone cameras to capture instances of police torture (which have helped put officers behind bars) and Facebook and Twitter accounts that carry messages for the world to read.
Khaled’s friends used these methods over the past few days, and have successfully leveraged security, who will always defend its men until the law stops them.
Khaled’s case is a lesson for the Egyptian security services, even if they are acquitted of this crime.
In the future, we expect security to immediately suspend accused officers until investigations are complete and to launch internal inquiries into such breaches, parallel to those of the general prosecution.
In the future, the interior ministry must issue an immediate statement affirming the law will take its course, and relaying the ministry’s condolences to the families of the deceased. And just as it expects people to wait for the outcome of investigations, the ministry must also wait instead of rushing to absolve its men of responsibility or hastily accusing the deceased of criminal activity.
The era of secrecy and intimidation has long passed. Just as the ministry possesses bullets and tear gas, the people now possess the Internet.
Translated from the Arabic Edition.
