An unexpected verdict in an unexpected time was how the retrial of business tycoon Hisham Talaat Mustafa ended, writes Shaden Shehab The appeal of business tycoon Hisham Talaat Mustafa and former State Security officer Mohsen El-Sukkari against the death sentence for their part in the murder of Lebanese singer Suzanne Tamim reached a conclusion on Tuesday when the court unexpectedly passed sentence. "The court orders life imprisonment [25 years under Egyptian law] for the first defendant, Mohsen El-Sukkari, for the murder of Suzanne Tamim, and three years for possessing weapons without a licence. The court orders 15 years with hard labour to the second defendant, Hisham Talaat Mustafa, for conspiring to murder Suzanne Tamim," judge Adel Abdel-Salam Gomaa told the spellbound courtroom. In May 2009 the Bab Al-Khalq Criminal Court handed both defendants capital sentences after eight months of hearings. Mustafa, 50, was found guilty of conspiring to murder Tamim and El-Sukkari, 41, guilty of killing the singer. On appeal, the Court of Cassation subsequently accepted that there had been procedural errors, judging much of the evidence presented in the initial hearings unacceptable. The retrial opened on 26 April at the Criminal Court in New Cairo. Court sessions had resumed this week after a three-month break caused by a lawyers' strike and prolonged by the summer recess. Gomaa originally adjourned the appeal hearings on 29 June, ordering they resume on 25 September for the closing statements of both the prosecution and defence. The prosecution duly gave its closing statements on Saturday. The next day, rather than summing up their case lawyers for the two defendants pressed 14 demands including the return of witnesses to the stand, the admission of analytical evidence and the transfer of court sessions to Dubai. When the judge agreed to all the defence's requests on Sunday except for relocating the trial proceedings to Dubai the case was postponed to Tuesday to hear Egyptian witnesses. Today's (Thursday) session was set aside for witnesses in Dubai, including the head of the criminal investigations, after the prosecution was asked to summon them. But what turned out to be the final session of the trial opened with the prosecutor handing the court a written report saying that the witnesses requested from Dubai had refused to come to Egypt to testify. The final session, which was the 13th, began with two witnesses, both forensic doctors, taking the stand. The court then went into recess. When it reconvened Gomaa confounded spectators by moving straight to a verdict, leaving the defence team complaining that they had not yet summed up. Complaints aside, the non-capital verdict came as a relief to defence lawyers who said they will appeal the ruling. If accepted, the Court of Cassation will give the third and final ruling. Talking briefly to amazed reporters after the judgement, Gomaa said he had no doubts the two defendants were guilty and would provide reasons for the reduced sentence in his report on the case during next month. Bahaaeddin Abu Shoqa, a leading member of the team, insists that the failure to hear the defence's closing statements constitutes a procedural error that should result in a complete retrial in front of the Court of Cassation. Farid El-Deeb, who heads Mustafa's defence team, does not agree. What the judge did, he argues, may have been unexpected but was in accordance to the law. If the prosecution does not contest the sentence, says El-Deeb, then the Court of Cassation can confirm it, hand the defendants a lighter sentence or judge them innocent, all without the necessity of a full retrial. What it cannot do is increase the sentence. It can only do that if the prosecution requests a harsher ruling which, says El-Deeb, would be an unusual step. Lawyers for both El-Sukkari and Mustafa view the verdict as a step towards the Court of Cassation eventually finding their clients innocent. "The worst is over. We have passed through the bottleneck, meaning the death sentence, and we expect them to be eventually judged innocent," says El-Deeb. Some legal experts suggest that in issuing a reduced sentence the court took into account that Tamim's father had dropped a civil case against Mustafa after the payment of diyya (compensation), though the details have not been made public. Although the payment of diyya is permissible under Islamic Sharia it is not part of Egyptian law, though it can be taken into consideration by a judge. Others say the judge was bounced into giving a verdict because the defence was attempting to prolong the case without presenting any new evidence. Tamim was murdered in her apartment at the Jumeira Beach Residence complex in Dubai on 28 July 2008. Mustafa allegedly paid El-Sukkari $2 million for the contract killing after Tamim ended a three-year affair with him. The billionaire property developer and onetime member of the Shura Council was arrested on 2 September 2008, following the lifting of his parliamentary immunity. El-Sukkari is accused of entering Tamim's apartment disguised as a worker from the residential complex's service company. He showed Tamim a false ID over the complex's entry system to gain access to her apartment building. Once in her apartment he knocked Tamim to the floor and slit her throat. El-Sukkari then threw his bloodstained clothes in a trash can next to the fire escape below Tamim's apartment and left the building. Dubai police collected DNA samples from the abandoned clothes and pictures of El-Sukkari were captured on the building's CCTV cameras. The case against the defendants also included tape recordings of telephone conversations between Mustafa and El-Sukkari. Throughout the first 10 sessions of the retrial Mustafa's defence team ignored the allegations against their client, concentrating instead on attempting to prove that El-Sukkari was innocent. Along with El-Sukkari's lawyer, Atef El-Mennawi, they focussed on attempting to show that the case against El-Sukkari was fabricated in Dubai. The defence team questioned the impartiality of the initial investigation conducted by the Dubai authorities, though none of the defence lawyers have indicated who they believe is behind the conspiracy. On Saturday, the 11th session of the retrial, the prosecution had demanded the "most severe punishment" for both men. Prosecutor Mustafa Suleiman said that when the case first became public he did not believe that Mustafa -- "a member of the ruling party" -- was involved. But investigations, he continued, have proved beyond doubt that he was behind the grisly murder. "Money and power may make people think they are above the law. We are here to prove them wrong," said Suleiman. Prosecution lawyer Mustafa Khater added that "the defence has hinted at a conspiracy against Mustafa by his business competitors yet no one was aware hitherto of any animosity between him and any other companies". He dismissed suggestions that El-Sukkari had been hired by someone to kill Tamim and implicate Mustafa. The 12th session, designated for the defence's summing up, opened with a simple statement from El-Deeb. "I have demands, your honour." "When your turn comes to speak, say them," he was told by Judge Gomaa. "I....," started El-Deeb. "If you please, when your turn comes," Gomaa said in a firmer tone. "If you please, sir, I have demands," El-Deeb replied. Gomaa adjourned the court and left for his chambers where he met with the defence team. The session resumed after half an hour with Gomaa allowing the lawyers of civil petitions relating to the criminal trial to present their cases even though, he said, they were out of the court's mandate. Lawyers for the two men -- Adel Maatooq and Riyadh El-Azzazi -- who claim to have been married to Tamim at the time of her murder, and who could receive large sums in compensation should either prove correct and the defendants be found guilty, then addressed the court. When they finished El-Deeb then announced the defence teams of both defendants would defer their closing statements until 14 requests had been considered. They included the demand that the original security tape that allegedly showed El-Sukkari in the apartment complex be produced and an expert be called to ascertain whether or not it had been tampered with, that additional witnesses, including personnel in Dubai responsible for the surveillance cameras, Egyptian police officers, the Dubai prosecutor and members of the Dubai forensic team which tested the clothes for DNA samples and fingerprints, be called to the stand, and that the court relocate to Dubai to allow it to examine the crime scene. The defence team also demanded that the fingerprints of British citizen Alex Kazaki, who was known to have had a relationship with Tamim, be obtained, and checked against unidentified fingerprints that they say were found at the crime scene. "Justice is what we seek. There is no need to hurry proceedings before the entire truth is revealed," said El-Deeb. Suleiman responded by saying that the defence's requests "aim to delay any ruling in this case". It has, he said, "already dragged on for two years during which the two men's lawyers have had ample opportunity to present their defence". He asked the three judge panel to refuse the requests. Inevitably, public scepticism over the reduction of Mustafa's sentence has been voiced, with many suggesting it is a result of his enormous wealth and connections. "This is a strange verdict that has never happened in the history of the Egyptian judicial system, The lawyers did not get to say their legal arguments or anything and the verdict was a lighter one," Reda Ghoneim, Maatouq's lawyer said.
