Egyptian court sentences 4-year-old boy to life
A four-year-old boy, Ahmed Mandour Karmi, has been sentenced to life in prison for committing four ‘murders’ when he was only one year old.
The boy was not in court on Tuesday when he was convicted of four counts of murder, eight of attempted murder, vandalising property and threatening police officers.
He was part of a list of 115 defendants who were all given life sentences at the same time at the court in Cairo, Egypt, for crimes committed in early 2014.
But his defence lawyer, Faisal al-Sayd, said Ahmed’s name was added to the list by mistake but the court did not give Ahmed’s birth certificate to the judge to show that he was born in September 2012.
He told the Jerusalem Post: ‘The child Ahmed Mansour Karni’s birth certificate was presented after state security forces added his name to the list of accused, but then the case was transferred to the military court and the child was sentenced in absentia in an ensuing court hearing.
‘This proves that the judge did not read the case’.
Another Egyptian lawyer Mohammed Abu Hurira said the case showed that the ‘Egyptian scales of justice are not reversible’ and that ‘Egypt is ruled by a bunch of lunatics.’
Since 2013, Egypt has been ruled by a military dictatorship under President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi.
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5 Comments
Sounds like an administrative/bureaucracy error. At least that bodes well for this crime going on the kid’s “permanent record”… 🙂
How come you say it bodes well for it not going on his permanent record when they are saying that the Egyptian scales of justice are not reversible? Do you think this 4 yo will be literally kept out of prison?
Good point. But they also say Egyptian justice is lunacy…I suspect that the ‘powers that be’, fearing looking foolish, will just make this incident vanish. This highlights a need for reform to any half-sensible person, and a dictator can’t permit that…(not when it can be used to show the magnanimity of “small government”)
Well if they can make it “go away” that would be good for the boy at least! I asked the same question of an Egyptian commenter on another thread, as I thought they might know if it is truly expected that this 4 yo will be sent to prison! The international media pressure surely might have an impact on this particular case, although mainstream media is quick to forget such cases when other stories come up that may be more interesting and diverting. Like the 4 you could be sent to prison, then after 5 days of some huffing and puffing, hardly anyone’s talking about it anymore in the media and there’s another symptom to talk about lol.
Madness
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