Egyptian convicted of spying for Israel dies in jail

CAIRO (Reuters) - An Egyptian engineer convicted in 2002 of spying for Israel has died in a Cairo jail of a possible heart attack while serving a 15-year sentence, security sources said on Monday.

Sherif al-Filali, 42, had initially been found innocent of espionage in 2001. His trial judge called him a true patriot because he turned himself in as soon as he realized he may have been involved in a crime.

But President Hosni Mubarak threw out that acquittal and ordered a retrial in an emergency state security court, where Filali was ultimately convicted in 2002 of trying to collect information and data on Egyptian tourism and a large-scale agricultural project for Israel.

Filali was found dead in his cell on Saturday morning, Egyptian prosecutors said. Security sources speaking on customary condition of anonymity said he had most likely died of a heart attack. They had initially said he was found on Sunday.

Excerpts from a forensic report on Filali's death made available to the media said there were no signs of foul play and no injuries on his body but gave few official clues as to the cause of death.

The medical examiner in charge said simply that Filali's death "resulted from a sharp drop in breathing and circulation and the stopping of his heart muscle". Prosecutors later said Filali had suffered from high blood pressure and had complained to another inmate recently of fatigue.

LONDON DEATH

Filali was among a handful of Egyptians serving jail sentences for passing secrets to Israel. His death comes a week after a nuclear engineer at the state-run Atomic Energy Agency was convicted of spying for Israel's Mossad intelligence agency in a separate case.

Last week, a former Egyptian official who has been named by Israeli officials as a source for Mossad, died after falling from his London balcony. Police were treating the death as "unexplained" but not suspicious.

Israeli media have said Ashraf Marwan, who died on Wednesday, passed a warning to Mossad on the eve of the 1973 Middle East war that Egypt and Syria were about to attack. Mubarak says Marwan, the son-in-law of former President Gamal Abdel Nasser, was a loyal patriot.

At the time of Filali's trial, court sources said that a Russian man who was convicted of espionage in absentia recruited Filali in Spain to obtain secret information about Egypt for Mossad. Israel has denied any involvement in the case.

Court documents said Filali shuttled between Egypt and Spain in 1999 before realizing the information he was collecting was for Israel. His 15-year sentence was less than the maximum 25-year penalty he could have received for spying in peacetime.

Rights groups had criticised the verdict as unfair, but the conviction could not be challenged as rulings in emergency state security courts are not subject for appeal.

Filali's arrest was announced shortly after Egypt, which in 1979 became the first Arab state to sign a peace treaty with Israel, recalled its ambassador from Tel Aviv in November 2000, accusing Israel of using excessive force against Palestinians.

Egypt returned an ambassador to Israel in 2005.