Giza Criminal Court sentenced 10 defendants to death and five others to life imprisonment on Saturday.
Those sentenced were accused of founding an illegal group, attacking the armed forces, targeting public establishments, inciting violence against Coptic Christians and possessing unlicensed firearms.
The trial, which has been dubbed the “Imbaba terror cell” case in local media outlets, began in September 2015.
The defendants, who received the death penalty, are all in state custody while three of the men who received life imprisonment were sentenced in absentia. One defendant died during the course of the trial.
The court started hearings in the case in September 2015 after the State Security Prosecution investigated the defendants and referred the case to the court with confessions by some defendants saying that they established the terrorist cell to overthrow the country’s government.
The group was also accused of aiming to endanger society by possessing firearms, participating in gatherings intended to commit a murder, destroying public property, attempting to kill police and army officers, destroying a police vehicles and manufacturing explosive devices.
Investigations also revealed that the defendants "formed a terrorist cell in the wake of the June 30, 2013 revolution, with the aim of securing armed marches organized by the Muslim Brotherhood in Giza.
They were also involved in carrying out hostile operations targeting police security installations in Giza by placing explosive devices in their vicinity, planning to assassinate the head of police station in Imbaba and a number of officers after monitoring their movements.
According to the public prosecution, the defendants “confessed during the investigations that they participated in the armed sit-ins of the Muslim Brotherhood in Rabia al-Adawiya and Nahda, and that they have financed the purchase and concealment of weapons to be used in their hostile operations against the police forces”.
