JINHA

NEWS CENTER – Egyptian human rights lawyer Mahinour Al-Masry has been sentenced to prison time for "attacking a police station" when she went to visit an arrested colleague in Alexandria in 2013.

An appeals court in Alexandria decided on a sentence of 15 months (a slight reduction of the original two year sentence) for Mahinour, who along with nine others was charged with "attacking a police station" for going to visit an arrested lawyer in Alexandria's Al Rami police station.

Mahinour Al-Masry was long active in defending human rights and activists in Egypt. Before the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, she had defended families in the Toson area who were being driven from their homes by the Mubarak regime, as well as striking workers in the Delta city of Mahalla. When young Khaled Saeed was killed by police, sparking the Tahrir Square uprising, Mahinour became active in supporting the revolution.

Despite the immense violence and pressure after the military coup in Egypt, Mahinour has continued her human rights advocacy in recent years. She has advocated for Syrian refugees fleeing war who were being deported from Egypt and called for an end to military trials of civilians in Egypt.

In October 2014, Mahinour received the Ludovic Trarieux International Human Rights Prize.

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