CAIRO - A criminal court in the coastal city of Alexandria sentenced two police detectives, who are convicted of beating blogger Khaled Saeed to death in 2010, to seven years in prison, ending a case that sparked the revolution against the rule of Hosni Mubarak. "The defendants are sentenced to seven years in jail for using cruelty against the victim," Judge Moussa el-Nahrawy said amid the heavy presence of media representatives, activists and other sympathisers. Saeed's death in June last year had sparked mass protests across Egypt and a Facebook page dedicated to him, 'We are all Khaled Saeed' helped launch the revolution that toppled Mubarak in February. As soon as he read out the ruling, the judge left the courtroom in complete chaos with the families of the two policemen Mahmoud Salah and Awad Ismail scuffling with the military police and the lawyers for Saeed's family. Routine police abuse and torture, rife in Hosni Mubarak's era, were a driving force behind the massive popular protests that ousted Mubarak. The verdict drew the ire of activists and Said's family, who complained the policemen had been granted 'veiled' impunity, promising to campaign for more protests. "Justice has not been done to Khaled Said and we will not budge," Saeed's uncle Ali Qassem told Reuters, adding he had expected a less lenient sentence. "The response to the verdict will be on the street and not inside the court," he added. Activists turned to the social networking websites to express their discontent over the ruling, which some of them said would re-trigger public anger. "The judiciary failed to bring justice for Khaled. Maybe the public pressure can succeed in this job," wrote one subscriber on his Facebook account. One person commenting on the Khaled Saeed Facebook page wrote: "A shameful verdict! 28th of October is the next revolution!". He was referring to Friday, a day on which protesters often take to the streets. A government report initially said that Saeed had died after choking on drugs, but in September a panel said that was not the case. Although pictures of Saeed's corpse showed a crushed face missing his lower lip, the government's chief coroner at the time said he died after ingesting a bag of marijuana. But the medical panel said in its report that Saeed died of asphyxiation after he was beaten, and a bag had been placed in his mouth after he fell unconscious. Saeed's case dominated the headlines for weeks and sparked nationwide outrage.
