Cairo - A Cairo criminal court on Thursday morning sentenced
Egyptian real-estate tycoon and lawmaker Hisham Talaat Mustafa to
death by hanging for the July murder of Lebanese pop singer Suzanne
Tamim.
The court found that Mustafa, who had been stripped of his
parliamentary immunity for the trial, had paid Mohsen al-Sukkari, a
former Egyptian security officer, the equivalent of 2 million US
dollars to murder the singer in her apartment in Dubai last July. The
court also sentenced al-Sukkari to death by hanging.
The death sentence must go to Egypt's mufti, the government's
supreme religious arbiter, for approval before a June 25 sentencing
hearing. The convicted men may appeal Thursday's verdict.
The court erupted in chaos after the judge read his verdict on
Thursday morning, as family and supporters of the two convicted men
shouted and wept in distress. Mustafa and al-Sukkari were quickly
removed from the courtroom.
Journalists thronged the courtroom for the session, which
concluded a lengthy trial in which the court heard taped
conversations between Mustafa and al-Sukkari and watched video
surveillance tapes apparently showing al-Sukkari at the singer's
building. Prosecutors also adduced DNA evidence from bloodstained
clothes they said al-Sukkari had left near Tamim's home.
Defence lawyers called a string of witnesses from Egyptian and
Emirati interior ministries, forensic experts, and friends of the
slain singer in a trial that stretched over more than two dozen court
sessions.
Reporters had been banned from covering the trial after reports of
Mustafa's arrest captivated the region. On August 10, authorities
confiscated copies of the Egyptian opposition newspaper al-Dustur
after the paper reported the accusations against Mustafa.
Tamim, who was 30 years old when she was found stabbed to death in
her Dubai apartment on July 28, had married Iraqi kick-boxer Riad
al-Azawi not long before her death. Prosecutors said that Mustafa,
whom they said was Tamim's ex-lover, contracted al-Sukarri to have
her killed out of jealousy.
Mustafa was a member of the Shura Council, the upper house of
Egypt's parliament, representing the ruling National Democratic Party
(NDP), and was widely reputed to have been a close associate of
President Hosny Mubarak and his son, Gamal, who chairs the NDP's
Policies Secretariat.
Shares in the Talaat Mustafa group, Egypt's leading real-estate
developer, dropped sharply in early trading on the Cairo and
Alexandria Stock Exchange Thursday morning. The company is now run by
Mustafa's brother, Tariq.
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