Egypt's fallen president faces execution or life imprisonment if found guilty

Tahrir Square, Cairo
January 2011

Deposed President Hosni Mubarak could face execution or life imprisonment if convicted of the charges of complicity to murder, corruption and plunder of public money, for which he is currently being investigated.

All of Egypt was taken aback by Prosecutor-general Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud ordering that the detention of deposed President Hosni Mubarak should be extended for a further 15 days. Not only did Abdel-Meguid’s order come after conflicting reports on the health condition of the deposed president, who is currently being held in Sharm El-Sheikh International Hospital, but also after widespread rumours that he might not be taken to Cairo to face more extensive questioning or to be placed at the hospital attached to Tora prison, where his two sons and most of his ex-regime’s henchmen are held in custody.

An official statement emphasised that Mubarak was questioned on two serious charges: ordering the killing of pro-democracy protesters in Tahrir Square and elsewhere in the country, and helping business tycoon Hussein Salem monopolise the sale of Egypt’s natural gas to Israel, at very cheap prices against a hefty commission. Mubarak was questioned in the presence of his lawyer, Farid El-Deeb. A team of doctors are to examine Mubarak on 26 April to see whether he can be moved to Tora prison in south Cairo or to the prison hospital.

The questioning of Mubarak came just a few days after several of his defunct ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) senior officials and business tycoons came under investigation on charges of involvement in mass murder, corruption and profiteering.

Questioned as a witness, Mubarak’s 13-day vice-president and former chief of intelligence Omar Suleiman said on 18 April that Mubarak had never issued orders to former interior minister Habib El-Adly to open fire on protesters. “On the contrary,” said Suleiman, “Mubarak was very clear in instructing El-Adly and police forces to exercise restraint, and to seek the help of the army in peacefully containing the protesters,” said Suleiman. The 13-day vice-president rather placed all the blame on the former interior minister for the killing of protesters on the 28 January (the Friday of Rage). “Though El-Adly was instructed by Mubarak to exercise restraint and seek the help of the army, El-Adly opted to issue orders for security forces to withdraw and open fire on protesters to protect themselves,” Suleiman said.

However, the former intelligence chief added, “I has strong suspicions that many of the NDP’s senior officials were implicated in masterminding the attacks on protesters at Tahrir Square on the 2nd of February (popularly known as the Battle of the Camel) but I do not know whether Mubarak had a hand in this battle or not."

In his own questioning, Mubarak's son and heir apparent Gamal vehemently denied that he had ever given orders to El-Adly to open fire on protesters.” In Gamal’s words “I have never been a state official, and never had the authority to give orders to anybody."

Mubarak himself told investigators during a very brief questioning on 13 April that he never issued orders for El-Adly to open fire on protesters. “El-Adly told me that a lot of Muslim Brotherhood members had infiltrated the Tahrir Square demonstrations, and we had fears that the revolution of the youth would be stolen by radical Islamists, but we never went to the extent of giving orders to kill the protesters."

All these testimonies were given the lie, however, by a report issued by a fact-finding committee on the bloody events of the 28 January and the Battle of the Camel on February 2nd. The report, released in a press conference on 19 April, pointed accusing fingers at Mubarak himself and his ex-interior minister Habib El-Adly.

In the words of the report, El-Adly could not issue orders for opening fire on protesters without the clear consent of Mubarak in his capacity as the President of the Republic. The report deplored that “neither the president nor the interior minister had ordered any investigation into these bloody incidents, nor did they intervene to bring a stop to the attacks or to hold accountable those who fired live rounds.” This, concluded the report, “means that Mubarak and his interior minister should be held accountable either by actual involvement or by complicity."

Concerning the “Battle of the Camel”, the report shied away from pointing direct accusing fingers at Mubarak. It stressed, however, that several senior officials of the defunct NDP participated in masterminding and sponsoring these attacks. Fathi Sorour, the former parliamentary speaker, also held in detention, told prosecutors on 20 April that he had never received orders by phone from Mubarak to send thugs and hooligans from south Cairo’s densely-populated El-Sayeda Zeinb district to attack protesters by use of knives, daggers, cudgels and molotov cocktails. Testimony provided by other former NDP MPs – especially the deputy of Al-Haram (the Pyramids) district, Abdel-Nasser El-Gabry, told investigators that top-ranking NDP officials, including Mubarak and his son Gamal, masterminded the attacks on protesters on 2nd February by camel and horse-back hooligans wielding swords and cudgels.

Mubarak was also questioned over his part in the signing of a natural gas export deal with Israel at prices below international markets, which amounted to a waste of public funds. On 21 April, prosecutor-general Abdel-Meguid ordered that former minister of petroleum Sameh Fahmi and five ex-ministry officials be remanded into custody for 15 days pending investigation into the sale of natural gas to Israel at below market prices. On 20 April, Abdel-Meguid ordered police authorities to ask Interpol to arrest businessman Hussein Salem who is charged with giving Mubarak a hefty commission in return for being given a monopoly of the sale of natural gas to Israel.

The prosecutor-general’s office unveiled that the selling of cheap Egyptian natural gas to Israel at prices far below international market rates lost the state treasury some $714 million. Israel gets 40 percent of its natural gas from Egypt, under an agreement signed in December, 2005. The fugitive Hussein Salem and other Israeli, American and Tai investors own, East Mediterranean Gas (EMG), which has a monopoly of the supply of Egyptian natural gas to Israel via a pipeline between Al-Arish, the capital of north Sinai, and the port city of Ashkelon in Israel.

It is widely rumoured that the ex-minister of petroleum, Sameh Fahmi, was formerly a consultant to Hussein Salem and he was rewarded in 1999 by being appointed a minister of petroleum to facilitate the selling of gas to Israel. Fahmi was helped several times by NDP officials to dodge answering questions leveled by opposition MPs during the 2005-2010 People’s Assembly on the sale of gas to Israel.

As for Salem, he has been branded by the press as Mubarak’s “front man” and “the king of Sharm El-Sheikh”. Salem told an Egyptian newspaper few years ago that he "knew Mubarak in the late 1960s and that since then they have held a strong friendship.” Several Western and local press reports have revealed evidence that Mubarak and Salem made a vast fortune from commissions gained from transporting American military assistance shipments to Egypt after signing peace with Israel in 1979. In 1994, Salem built the Mubarak family 3 luxurious villas at the Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh where Mubarak opted to stay after being deposed from power on 11 February.

Several judicial experts believe that Mubarak may be executed or jailed for life if convicted of the charges against him. Zakaria Shalash, a legal expert, said Mubarak could face execution if found guilty of ordering the killing of protesters and peddling influence to embezzle public funds.

Source: Ahram Online, April 23, 2011

_________________________

Use the tags below or the search engine at the top of this page to find updates, older or related articles on this Website.

Comments

Alabama Set To Carry Out Execution This Week

Alabama is preparing to execute Jeremy Williams, who pled guilty to the 2021 rape and murder of five-year-old Kamarie Holland. The execution is scheduled for Thursday (August 13) at the Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Alabama. Williams, who is 41, requested the death penalty and waived his right to appeal, making this the first execution in Alabama this year.

Alabama executes Jeremy Williams

Tennessee and Oklahoma have put inmates to death within 30 minutes of each other, and Alabama followed suit hours later as U.S. states executed three men in one day. Tennessee and Oklahoma put inmates to death within 30 minutes of each other Thursday, and Alabama followed suit hours later as U.S. states executed three men by lethal injection in one day for the first time since 2010. The Tennessee man was executed for killing a maid at a motel in 1985, and the Oklahoma man for killing his girlfriend in 2003. In Alabama, a man was put to death Thursday evening for killing a 5-year-old girl he had paid her mother to abuse.

Tennessee | The doctor who helps put prisoners to death

Dr. Mark Fowler assisted in the failed execution of a Tennessee prisoner. Physicians are meant to heal patients—why is he working in the death chamber? Mark Fowler, a physician with 25 years’ experience, stepped beneath the bright lights and approached the middle-aged man lying on a gurney. Around him, people in medical gowns prepared needles and sterile tubing. It had all the appearances of a hospital setting. Fowler had been called in to help establish an IV line through which the 57-year-old man, Tony Carruthers, would be injected with pharmaceutical drugs. The team had struggled to find a vein, so Fowler was summoned to set a central line—an intravenous catheter inserted into the major vein below the collarbone.

Tennessee executes Darrell Hines

The state has spent millions of dollars over decades to execute a seriously ill man who was already incarcerated. The state of Tennessee executed death row inmate Darrell Hines Thursday morning, according to an advocacy group. No formal announcement of the execution has been issued by state leaders yet. The execution was slated for 10 a.m. Thursday at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. [DPN update] Hines was pronounced dead at 10:43 a.m. CDT. His last meal was fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, coleslaw, corn, fries, biscuits, a chicken sandwich, chocolate chip cake, and sweet tea.

The 'Black Widow' shakes Iran: 10 death sentences for a serial killer who killed 12 men

Kolthum Akbari, an Iranian woman widely dubbed the “Black Widow,” was convicted of serial murders of elderly men she married, often temporarily. Official accounts generally center on 11 murders (plus one attempted murder), though Akbari herself gave varying figures and investigations suggested she had many more marriages. The sentencing occurred primarily in September 2025 in Mazandaran Province, with ongoing reporting and updates into 2026. The 56- to 59-year-old killer confessed to killing at least 11 elderly men after temporarily or officially marrying them; Iranian authorities have linked her to additional marriages and possible further victims.

Oklahoma executes Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez

Oklahoma has carried out 1 of 3 executions set for the same day in the United States in another sign of the resurgence of the death penalty in the country. Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez was pronounced dead at 10:13 a.m. on Thursday, Aug. 13, at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester. He was put to death by lethal injection for the murder of his common-law wife in 2003 at their Oklahoma City home. He admitted to police he shot her twice during an argument. Cuesta-Rodriguez, 70, did not fight for his life, stunning his attorneys in July when he told the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board that he didn't want clemency. "It's time for me to pay for what I did," he said.

Tennessee set to execute Anthony Darrell Hines

Barring any last-minute interventions, the Tennessee Department of Correction will execute Anthony Darrell Hines by lethal injection at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville Thursday morning. This week, two courts had the opportunity to halt the execution: the federal court in Middle Tennessee and the U.S. Supreme Court. Gov. Bill Lee announced Tuesday he personally would not prevent the execution. “After deliberate consideration of Anthony Darrell Hines’ request for clemency, and after a thorough review of the case, I am upholding the sentence of the State of Tennessee and do not plan to intervene,” he said in a written statement. The U.S. Supreme Court has not granted a stay or reprieve.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine issues three death penalty reprieves

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine issued execution reprieves for three death row inmates on Friday. In a statement, DeWine said he issued reprieves for Keith LaMar, Scott Group, and Davel Chinn, all of whom were set to be executed early next year. LaMar was scheduled to be executed on Jan. 13, 2027. He was convicted of aggravated murder for the deaths of five inmates during a 1993 riot at the Southern Ohio Correctional Institution in Lucasville. He received the death penalty for four of the killings. His new execution date is Jan. 13, 2030. Watch the latest NBC4 headlines in the video player above.

Arizona prosecutors seek death penalty a second time for 2 inmates

County Attorney Brad Miller said Aug. 6 that the nature of the attack and both men's past criminal records meet the strict legal bar required for execution under Arizona law. FLORENCE, Ariz. - Pinal County prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against two inmates accused of violently killing a fellow prisoner behind bars, officials announced Thursday. Pinal County Attorney Brad Miller filed a Notice of Intent to Seek the Death Penalty against Pete Van Winkle and Tracy Hampton in connection with the fatal attack on Kenneth Thompson.

Iran’s War on Women: Executions, Floggings, and the Politics of Fear

The Iranian regime is increasingly using death sentences, corporal punishment, and judicial persecution against women—not only to silence dissent but also to intimidate a society demanding change. The Iranian regime has long viewed women as central to the country’s struggle for freedom—and therefore as central targets of repression. The nationwide uprising of 2022 fundamentally altered the political landscape, demonstrating that Iranian women were no longer merely participants in protest movements but among their principal organizers and symbols. Since then, the authorities have steadily intensified their campaign against women, expanding the use of executions, imprisonment, corporal punishment, and judicial intimidation.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog