Egypt police convicted over deaths

A court in Cairo has convicted four Egyptian policemen over the deaths of 37 Islamist detainees last August. Deputy chief of Heliopolis police station Lt Col Amr Farouk was sentenced to 10 years in prison for involuntary manslaughter and extreme negligence. The other three officers were given one-year suspended sentences. The detainees died as a result of suffocation when tear gas was fired into the back of a vehicle transporting 45 of them to a prison outside Cairo. Security officials initially said the detainees had rioted and captured a guard while en route to Abu Zabal prison on 18 August, causing the officers to respond by firing tear gas into the vehicle, according to BBC.