CAIRO (AP) — Hosni Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison Saturday for failing to stop the killing of protesters during the uprising that forced him from power last year. The ousted president and his sons were acquitted, however, of corruption charges in a mixed verdict that swiftly provoked a new wave of anger on Egypt's streets.
Revolutionary
groups and the powerful Muslim Brotherhood have called for a massive
protest at Tahrir Square, the heart of the uprising, at 5 p.m. local
time.
After the sentencing,
the 84-year old Mubarak suffered a "health crisis" while on a helicopter
flight to a Cairo prison hospital, according to security officials who
spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to
speak to the media. One state media report said it was a heart attack,
but that could not immediately be confirmed
The officials said Mubarak cried
in protest and resisted leaving the helicopter that took him to a prison
hospital for the first time since he was detained in April 2011.
Mubarak stayed at a regular hospital in his favorite Red Sea resort of
Sharm el-Sheikh from his arrest until his trial began in on Aug. 3. The
officials said he insisted on the helicopter that he be flown to the
military hospital on the eastern outskirts of Cairo where he has stayed
during the trial.
Mubarak finally left the chopper and moved to the Torah prison hospital more than two hours after his helicopter landed there.
Earlier,
Mubarak sat stone-faced and frowning in the courtroom's metal
defendants' cage while judge Ahmed Rifaat read out the conviction and
sentence against him, showing no emotion with his eyes concealed by dark
sunglasses. His sons Gamal and Alaa looked nervous but also did not
react to either the conviction of their father or their own acquittals.
Mubarak
was convicted of complicity in the killing of some 900 protesters
during the 18-day uprising that forced him to resign in February 2011.
He and his two sons were acquitted of corruption charges, along with a
family friend who is on the run.
Rifaat
opened the session with a strongly worded statement before handing down
the verdicts. He expressed deep sympathy for the uprising.
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