The supporters of former President Mohamed Mursi were convicted for attacks on people.

A court in Egypt yesterday, March 24, 2014, sentenced 528 supporters of ousted Islamist President, Mohamed Mursi, to death, the BBC said. They were convicted of charges including murdering a policeman and attacks on people and property. The group is among some 1,200 Muslim Brotherhood supporters on trial, including senior members.

The court in Minya, north of Cairo, issued its ruling after just two sessions in which the defendants' lawyers complained they had had no chance to present their case, NBC News reported. Some 147 suspects were in court for the trial - the others were convicted in absentia, reports said.

The court also acquitted 16 other defendants. The attacks took place in August 2013 after security forces broke up two camps of pro-Mursi supporters in Cairo, killing hundreds of people. Mursi was ousted by the military last July following mass street protests against his government. He is facing four separate trials.

The speed of the case and the severity of the outcome are unprecedented in Egypt, sources said. In a case concerning the killing of a single police officer, more than 520 defendants were sentenced to death at a breathtaking pace. The first hearing on Saturday, March 22, 2014 was quickly adjourned. At yesterday’s second sitting, the mass death sentences were announced.

A spokesman for the banned Muslim Brotherhood said the verdict came from a ‘Kangaroo court.’ One human rights campaigner said judges had become a tool for taking revenge. Also reacting, Amnesty International described the decision as “a grotesque example of the shortcomings and the selective nature of Egypt's justice system,” adding that it was the largest single batch of simultaneous death sentences it ever saw anywhere in the world.