Egypt jails Brotherhood leaders for 15 years over lawyer's torture

Thousands of Muslim Brotherhood members and supporters have been jailed, with hundreds receiving lengthy prison terms, in a brutal government crackdown since the army ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi last July.

The court in Cairo on Saturday sentenced Brotherhood leaders Mohamed al-Beltagy and Safwat Hegazy as well as an Al-Jazeera journalist and one other defendant for 15 years, the sources said.

Four other defendants, including Osama Yassin, youth minister during Morsi’s turbulent one-year rule, were jailed for three years.

The defendants were convicted of “torturing, electrocuting and sexually assaulting” a lawyer after locking him up for three days inside the office of a travel agency near Cairo’s Tahrir Square on February 3, when the roundabout was packed with protesters calling for Mubarak’s ouster.

Beltagy and Hegazy are being tried in several other cases along with other senior Brotherhood leaders, including Morsi himself.

A government crackdown on Morsi supporters has left at least 1,400 people dead and more than 15,000 jailed. Hundreds have also been sentenced to death after often speedy trials.-AFP