683 supporters of Mohamed Morsi, including the Muslim Brotherhood’s Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie were sentenced to death by a court in the city of Minya today. Media reported neither all the defendants nor their defense lawyers were present when the ruling was handed down after a single court session. Judge Saeed Youssef, the same judge who sentenced 529 pro-Morsi protesters to death in March, presided over the trial.
The defendants were charged with taking part in the attack on Adawa police station in Minya, where police officers Mamdouh Kotb and Mohamed Kotb were killed, following the violent dispersal of pro-Morsi protesters in Rabaa and Nahda Squares in Cairo.
The verdict, however, has been passed to Grand Mufti Shawqy Allam for review. He is not required by Egyptian law to provide an opinion on the ruling, but the final verdict will not be released and appeals cannot be heard until Allam has had the opportunity to review the case.