The defense lawyer of Mohamed Ibrahim Abdel Moneim, a policeman charged with killing of protesters during the January revolution, accused Egypt’s public prosecution of fabricating evidence against his client. The Cairo Criminal Court on Wednesday resumed retrial of Abdel Moneim, also known as Mohamed al-Sunni, on charges of killing protesters on 28 January, 2011, a day known as the “Friday of Anger.”
On 15 January, after fleeing for 11 months, the fugitive policeman turned himself in to stand trial for killing protesters in front of Zawya Hamra police station, Cairo. Sunni claims he is being used as a scapegoat by the police and the Interior Ministry.
Cairo Criminal Court has already handed Sunni several sentences — including two death sentences — in absentia for killing protesters during the 25 January revolution.
In those cases, the prosecution said investigators proved that he intentionally killed 18 people with live fire.
The trial also involves police officers Alaa Abdel Razek and Hazem al-Kholi who worked at the same police station as Sunni. On Wednesday, the court listened to Sunni’s defense team, which pleaded not guilty to felony murder and argued the prosecution fabricated evidence.
"There are a number of shortcomings in the prosecution’s investigations, especially since the referral does not include the autopsy which indicates the type of weapons used to kill the victims, or the number of police and formation of the police force that was present at the station," said Sunni’s lawyer
The defense argued that “the defendant was legally defending a governmental, state-owned building and was practicing self-defense and defending others as protesters attacked the police station with stones and Molotov cocktails.”
Sunni’s lawyer added that the prosecution "charged the defendant with felony murder… which means the defendant chose who to kill, as if the prosecution was present at the time the incident."
He explained that "after protesters’ attacks intensified on the police station, Sunni took a shotgun from a policeman at the station and used it for legal self defense and to defend his place of work after the police department caught on fire and prisoners escaped."
The defense presented a medical report showing that the defendant had been injured with a five-centimeter cut to the head, a fact that proves the defendant was acting in self-defense, it argued.
Translated from Al-Masry Al-Youm
