Egyptian security forces stand guard outside the constitutional court in the capital Cairo (Picture: MOHAMED EL-SHAHED/AFP/Getty Images)

A four-year-old boy has been sentenced to life in prison for committing four ‘murders’ when he was only one year old.

Ahmed Mansour Karmi was not in court on Tuesday when he was convicted of four counts of murder, eight of attempted murder, vandalising property and threatening police officers.

He was part of a list of 115 defendants who were all given life sentences at the same time at the court in Cairo, Egypt, for crimes committed in early 2014.

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But his defence lawyer, Faisal al-Sayd, said Ahmed’s name was added to the list by mistake but the court did not give Ahmed’s birth certificate to the judge to show that he was born in September 2012.



He told the Jerusalem Post: ‘The child Ahmed Mansour Karni’s birth certificate was presented after state security forces added his name to the list of accused, but then the case was transferred to the military court and the child was sentenced in absentia in an ensuing court hearing.

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‘This proves that the judge did not read the case’.

Another Egyptian lawyer Mohammed Abu Hurira said the case showed that the ‘Egyptian scales of justice are not reversible’ and that ‘Egypt is ruled by a bunch of lunatics.’

Since 2013, Egypt has been ruled by a military dictatorship under President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi.