Regeni case: three Egyptian secret service agents sentenced to ten years, one acquitted. The parents: “We are satisfied”

The judges of the First Court of Assizes in Rome, following a deliberation lasting over eight hours, have convicted three Egyptian intelligence officers on trial for the abduction and murder of Giulio Regeni, the researcher from Friuli who was tortured and killed in Egypt in 2016. The court dismissed the murder charge under ‘count A’The three convicted defendants were therefore found guilty of the charge of abduction, which took place in Cairo on 25 January ten years ago. Colonels Uhsam Helmi and Athar Kamel Mohamed Ibrahim, and Major Magdi Ibrahim Abdelal Sharif, were each sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment, whilst General Tariq Sabir was acquitted. In the courtroom, alongside the Regeni family and their lawyer, Alessandra Ballerini, and the lead prosecutor in the case, Deputy Public Prosecutor Sergio Colaiocco, Chief Public Prosecutor Francesco Lo Voi was also present for the reading of the judgement. He stated: “We will have to wait for the reasons for the judgement to gain a full picture of the Court of Assizes’ reasoning; I think it is fair to say that the substance of the prosecution’s case has held up.” Speaking to journalists as they left the packed courtroom, Giulio’s parents simply said: “We are satisfied.”

The three convicted individuals have also been permanently barred from holding public office. The grounds for the judgement will be filed within 90 days. The three have also been ordered, jointly and severally, to pay compensation for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damages to the civil parties, to be determined in separate proceedings. The Court has awarded provisional payments, immediately enforceable, totalling 650,000 euros: 200,000 to Claudio Regeni, 200,000 to Paola Deffendi, 100,000 to Irene Regeni and 150,000 to the Presidency of the Council of Ministers. The first-instance judgement did not take into account the requests made by the prosecutor, Sergio Colaiocco, who had sought a life sentence for the first defendant and 17 years and 6 months for the second. The trial took place in the absence of the defendants, as it had not been possible to serve them with the notices of investigation and other procedural documents because they were ‘untraceable’. The authorities in Cairo refused to provide their home addresses to the Italian judiciary.

“Beyond the individual convictions, it is clear that the prosecution’s case has stood up to the Court’s scrutiny. We will need to read the grounds for the judgement. Now the government must also take note of this, claim the damages awarded by the State Legal Service and sever ties with a country which, far from being safe, tortures and kills even the citizens of so-called ‘friendly’ states.” This was stated by Giulio’s family’s lawyer, Alessandra Ballerini, as she left the courtroom after the verdict was read out.

The body of the 28-year-old researcher, who was in Egypt to conduct research into local trade unions, was found along the Cairo–Alexandria motorway on 3 February 2016, ten days after he went missing.