CAIRO
Egyptian security forces tightened up security measures on Saturday ahead of verdicts in the trials of ousted President Mohamed Morsi on charges of espionage and jailbreak.
Barricades have been set up outside the Police Academy in eastern Cairo, where the trial is being held.
Security forces have barred lawyers and media personnel from taking mobile phones into the courthouse, according to an Anadolu Agency reporter.
Morsi and 35 co-defendants, including leading members of his Muslim Brotherhood group, face charges of "conspiring" with Palestinian group Hamas and Lebanon's Hezbollah to carry out "terrorist acts" inside Egypt.
The ousted president and 130 others are also charged with taking part in a mass jailbreak during Egypt's January 2011 uprising that ousted autocratic President Hosni Mubarak.
Morsi and his co-defendants emphatically deny all the charges against them, which they insist are politically driven.
Last month, Morsi and 12 co-defendants were sentenced to 20 years in prison each for mobilizing supporters in order to "intimidate, detain and torture" dozens of anti-Morsi protesters during clashes outside eastern Cairo's Ittihadiya presidential palace in December 2012.
Egypt's first-ever democratically elected leader, Morsi was ousted by the military in mid-2013 – after only one year in office – following mass protests against his presidency.
He currently faces multiple criminal charges, including spy and "offending Egypt's judiciary."
