Military officer faces homicide, attempted murder charges after killing mother, injuring 4 family members in car-ramming attack

An Armed Forces officer is to stand trial on charges of premeditated murder and attempted murder after the military medic repeatedly drove his car into a family of five on Sunday in New Cairo.

The incident took place in the upscale residential compound of Madinaty after one of the family’s three children bumped his push-scooter into a car belonging to the officer, scratching the vehicle.

A verbal dispute ensued following which the officer, an Armed Forces medic, drove his car at the family of five, killing the mother, pharmacist Basma Ali, and injuring her husband, Hamdeen Zaki and their three children.
Footage of the sequence of events was published on social media, stirring public anger and sadness at the act of arbitrary violence perpetrated by a member of the military. 

In the wake of the incident on Sunday, several state-aligned websites and news outlets mischaracterized the events as a traffic accident saying that the officer hit the family while driving at an excessive speed. 

Yet Zaki, a veterinarian, denied these claims, telling fact-checking platform Saheeh Masr that the offender was his neighbor, an Armed Forces medic.

One of Zaki’s children, aged 11, bumped into the officer's car with his scooter and scratched it, after which a confrontation escalated into a verbal dispute before the officer ran over the family with his car. The officer hit Ali twice with his vehicle, killing the pharmacist and mother. All three children sustained injuries.

Though Zaki’s injuries were minor, said a neighbor of the family, Osama Khairy, who was witness to the homicide, yet Zaki’s psychological condition deteriorated after he had given his statement to the military prosecutor and the father was later admitted to the university hospital in Tanta.

The incident sparked public outrage. Responding to the “brutal assault” the Pharmacists Syndicate said it would follow up on investigations in a statement mourning Basma Ali’s death.

Ensuring its “complete respect for the principle of the rule of law,” the Armed Forces came out in a Tuesday statement to state that the offender, currently held in remand by the military prosecution, is to face charges of intentional homicide and attempted murder in a trial before a military criminal court. If convicted of homicide, the officer could face life in prison under the Penal Code.   

Yet since the trial will take place in a military court, the victim’s lawyer will not play any role in the trial.

The 2014 Constitution grants the military judiciary exclusive jurisdiction over any offense involving the Armed Forces and its members, suspending standard civil procedures. 

The events were met with an outpouring of public anger and suspicion regarding whether the officer would be held accountable. In similar incidents, the social standing and authority associated with the Armed Forces has derailed accountability processes. In a 2022 incident, for example, footage circulated showing five nurses and three hospital staff being physically assaulted by an air force pilot and his family at Monufiya’s Qesna Hospital. One of the nurses in the incident told Mada Masr at the time that the “police refused to file a report because of the pilot’s affiliation with the Armed Forces.” 

The Public Prosecution announced days after the hospital incident that the military would question the officer involved. A legal source who spoke to Mada Masr at the time noted that information regarding ongoing legal proceedings would not be available except via the military judiciary itself.

*Writing by Salma Hindy