2 police conscripts detained until appeal session of assault on Matariya doctors

Court will decide on three-year sentence on 16 January; other sentenced defendants on the loose, says lawyer

Two police conscripts were detained on Monday until the court examined their appeal against a three-year imprisonment verdict for assaulting two doctors at the Matariya Teaching hospital.
The court will issue its ruling on 16 January, according to lawyer Sayeda Kandil, who defended the doctors, and different media reports, the latter of which claimed the defendants were released.
Kandil explained that the defendants were indeed released pending trial when they appeared in court on Monday, but by the end of the session, the court had ordered their detention.
The case initially included nine defendants, seven of whom are at large, while the two recently detained conscripts are appealing against their verdict.
"Since the beginning of the investigations, the nine defendants were briefly detained overnight. Since then, they have been on the loose and their lawyers attended most sessions on their behalf," Kandil told Daily News Egypt on Tuesday.
Kandil highlighted the Interior Ministry's responsibility in executing the court's verdict, which sentenced them to three years in prison on 20 September.
The case goes back to January when two doctors at the Matariya Teaching hospital were assaulted and detained following a misunderstanding with an injured police conscript.
The incident had sparked the gathering of more than 10,000 doctors at the headquarters of their syndicate on 12 February, denouncing police brutality.
For their part, the conscripts had accused the doctors of assaulting them after undermining their injured colleague's medical treatment.