By Sarah Carr
CAIRO: The Alexandria appeals prosecution office has sent two policemen to trial on charges related to the death of Khaled Saeid.
Thirty-three-year-old Awad Ismail Suleiman and 26-year-old Mahmoud Sabry Mahmoud will face charges of misuse of force by a government official, illegal arrest and torture of an individual without legal grounds.
Misuse of force is punishable by a one-year prison sentence or fine of no more than LE 200, illegal arrest by an undefined jail sentence carries a fine of no more than LE 200, while individuals convicted of torturing an individual they have arrested without legal grounds are liable to a prison term in a high-security prison.
The two defendants are being held in custody until their court appearance.
Khaled Saeid, 28, died on June 6 after Suleiman and Mahmoud apprehended him in an Alexandrian internet café.
Two autopsies performed on Saeid’s body both determined that the cause of his death was asphyxiation caused by swallowing a drug wrap of marijuana.
The reports were rejected by Saeid’s family and eyewitnesses who allege that Suleiman and Mahmoud beat him to death.
According to the Nadeem Center for the Rehabilitation of the Victims of Violence, two senior officers, who were allegedly implicated in the death of Saeid, will not be charged with any offence.
