An Egyptian court ruled on Easter Sunday that the murderer of a Coptic man, who was targeted because he sold alcohol, will be executed, reports Egypt-based Copts United.
Adel Aboul Nour Suleiman was sentenced to death last year for killing Youssef Lamei in January 2017. Sunday’s ruling rejected an appeal against the sentence by Suleiman’s lawyer.
During the 2017 court case, Suleiman said he was “proud” of committing the crime, which, he added, was “based on a number of fatwas issued by extremist clerics, who order the killing of alcohol sellers”.
Lamei’s son Tony told World Watch Monitor after the initial sentencing that he believed his father had been targeted “because he was a Christian”. He said many shops in Alexandria sold alcohol: “There is a shop nearby that sells alcohol and is owned by a Muslim man. Why didn’t they kill this man as well?”
Youssef Lamei had a licence from the government to sell alcohol and had run the shop for almost 40 years.