CAIRO, Dec 2 (Aswat Masriya) – The Court of Appeals scheduled on Tuesday the retrial of four police officers accused of manslaughter in the case of the Abu Zaabal police van, due to begin on January 22.

A Cairo Misdemeanour Court of Appeals had cancelled the sentences served to the four police officers charged with negligence which led to the death of 37 detainees inside a police van outside Abu Zaabal Prison in August, 2013. Overturning the verdict paved the way for a retrial.

The detainees were arrested following the forcible dispersal of the pro-Mohamed Mursi Rabaa al-Adawiya sit-in on August 14, 2013. They were in a police van outside the Abu Zaabal Prison in Cairo at the time of the incident.

The 37 detainees were killed when policemen fired a teargas canister inside the van, after the detainees complained of inadequate ventilation and allegedly created a disturbance.

Investigations had revealed that the ventilation system in the police van was broken and that there were 45 prisoners inside the car, while its capacity could accommodate no more than 24 persons.

The prosecutor-general had charged the four police officers with manslaughter, citing the inability to prove their criminal intent in murder, a prerequisite in pressing first-degree-murder charges.

Lawyers representing the victims in court had long pushed for referring the case to the criminal court instead and charging the defendants with first-degree murder.

The vice warden of the Heliopolis Police Station was sentenced to 10 years in prison in March 18, while the three other police officers were served a suspended sentence of one year in prison each.