The West Cairo Incident Prosecution, headed by Judge Ahmed Labib, ordered the release of five police officers on EGP 5,000 bail, and the imprisonment of three other police officers for four days, who are accused of beating a citizen to death.
The entire group of officers were referred to investigation for allegedly beating a workshop owner named Hussien Farghaly inside Al-Wayli police station on Wednesday, according to videos presented to the general prosecution.
The investigation proved the involvement of only three police officers in the case and they will remain in prison for four additional days. During the investigation, the defendants denied the accusation of beating the man to death.
A video circulated on social media showed a police force beating Farghaly and verbally assaulting and threatening his family who tried to prevent the police from detaining him. The police officers allegedly did not show a warrant from the prosecution.
The police were allegedly seeking to detain the shop owner over a dispute with the landlord about renting the workshop.
Farghaly’s body was transferred to Dar Al-Shifaa hospital, where local reporters said the doctors noticed bruises and injuries to his body.
In recent months, police brutality in Egypt has increased inside police stations and prisons according to media reports and online videos. However, the Interior Ministry denied all incidents of torture by police officers, saying that these are “individual cases” which do not represent the ministry as whole.
