The mother of Mohamed ‘Hamada’ Khalil, the man who authorities claimed was a Muslim Brotherhood member and was then shot to death by policeman Ahmed al-Rakeeb inside his detention cell, denied her son's ties to the organization.
“My son is not from the Brotherhood. He supports Sisi,” she shouted outside the Imbaba police station.
Though Giza Security Directorate leaders told her the law will attain her retribution, it was clear the family and friends of the victim were angry while they were waiting on Sunday evening for his mother, who collapsed when she arrived.
They said Khalil had come to the station to bail out a friend who was accused of inciting violence, but old differences between him and Mohamed Khalil, the policeman in charge of the computer, led to clashes and drove Khalil to shoot him.
“Hamada printed and sold T-shirts. He had no enemies. He had an opinion about what happens just like anybody else, but he was not from the Muslim Brotherhood,” said Mohamed Abdel Rahman, a friend of the victim.
North Giza Prosecution’s investigators said that al-Rakeeb killed the victim as a result of a physical altercation, causing the policeman to fire three shots.
Investigators said previous conflicts had arisen between the victim and the defendant, who used to slap the victim.
Authorities claimed Khalil was involved in several incidents of riots and violence as well as protesting without permission, which prompted Rakeeb to arrest him when he entered the police station. Khalil had come to pay LE10,000 bail to release a lawyer involved in the same incident he was involved in.
Once Rakeeb took Khalil to the detention cell of Imbaba police station, altercations were renewed, to which Rakeeb responded by shooting him three times in the chest, back and stomach.
Prosecution ordered keeping the policeman’s gun and sample of the blood found on the group. Investigations were postponed until Monday to summon the police officer of the station and other policemen.
Egypt's treatment of it's prisoners has been under scrutiny since the beginning of the crackdown of Muslim Brotherhood supporters. On 18 August, 37 prisoners died of asphyxiation while they were being transfered to another prison. Investigations showed that a police officer has fired tear gas into the overcrowded transport van, causing their death.
In Dar al-Salam police station, four suspects died in a span of two months in early 2014 due to poor health conditions in the detention facility. South Cairo prosecution attorney general visited the cells, finding they were at more than double capacity and the ventilation fans were broken, leading to dangerously poor air quality.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
