Human Rights Watch: Egypt's trial of Morsi 'badly flawed'
CAIRO - The trial of former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, deposed by the army and sentenced to 20 years in jail, was "badly flawed" and appears to have been politically motivated, Human Rights Watch said on Sunday.
A court on April 21 convicted Morsi and 12 other Muslim Brotherhood members of violence, kidnapping and torture over the deaths of protesters in 2012. They were acquitted of murder, which carries the death sentence.
Human Rights Watch said Morsi's detention without charge for more than three weeks after his removal from office violated Egyptian law, and it criticized the prosecution's heavy reliance on the testimony of military and police officers.
"Whatever political responsibility (Morsi) may have, the prosecution didn't establish his criminal guilt in this case", the rights group said in a statement entitled "Egypt: (Morsi) Trial Badly Flawed".
