Cairo Criminal Court sentenced Tuesday the ousted President, Mohamed Morsi and 17 co-convicts to life in prison over charges of jailbreak and espionage. The court sentenced 3 convicts to death, including Deputy Supreme Guide, Khairat Al Shater, Mohamed Al Beltagy and the former office manager of Morsi, Ahmed Abdel Atty, whilst sentencing 2 others to 7 years in prison, and the other fugitive convicts were sentenced to death. The case includes 36 defendants, 13 in absentia and one of the detainees died in prison. The court had referred the case to Egypt's Grand Mufti on May 16, after handing Morsi and co-defendants initial death penalties, to give his non-binding opinion on the convicts' execution, Sky News Arabia reported. Morsi and co-convicts are charged with murder and breaking into the Wadi Natrun prison during the 2011 uprising which toppled former President, Hosni Mubarak. The court had fixed the June 2 session to issue its final verdict. The court had also referred the cases of 16 other Muslim Brotherhood (MB) leaders to the Grand Mufti, including MB Deputy Supreme Guide Khairat Al Shater, Mohamed Al Beltagy, Saad Al Katatny, Mahmoud Ezzat, Salah Abdel Maksoud and Chairman of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, Youssef Al Qaradawi among others. Morsi already received a life sentence last April for the killing of peaceful protestors December 2012 in the Ittihadiya Palace case.
