An Ismailia court referred 19 defendants convicted of murder to Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa Thursday to decide whether they should be sentenced to death.
Seventeen of the 19 are fugitives and were convicted in absentia. They were found guilty of killing a man inside a mosque during Ramadan.
The court adjourned the case to 10 November to issue the sentences.
Prosecutors accused the defendants of premeditated murder after they waited for the victim, Osama al-Sayed Mehailas, near a mosque. When the defendants saw Mehailas enter the mosque, they followed him inside then stabbed and beat him to death.
The defendants were also charged with desecrating a house of worship.
Mehailas, in his 20s, was killed in Abu Elian Mosque in Tal al-Kabier village.
Investigations indicated that the perpetrators had a fight with the victim’s cousin, in which one of their relatives was killed.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
