Hosni Mubarak: It ends in tears for Egypt's last Pharoah

For nearly 30 years he was the pharaoh-like ruler whose word was law, the plunderer of billions of pounds of government money and controller of Egypt's brutal police state.

Last night (Saturday) Hosni Mubarak began a new life as a convicted murderer. A broken and humiliated man of 84, he was flown by helicopter to Torah prison - where many of his enemies had once been jailed - just two hours after hearing a Cairo judge pronounce a life sentence on him for complicity in the murder of 850 protesters.

He appeared to be in tears and at first refused to leave the plane as he realised that he had not been taken to the military hospital where he had spent most of the nine months since his trial began.

Last night, amid rumours that he might have suffered a heart attack, he was beginning a life sentence in the hospital wing of the Cairo prison - the first leader toppled by his own people in the Arab Spring to attend his own trial and be incarcerated in one of his own prisons.

Convicted alongside him was Habib al-Adly, the former interior minister and a loyal ally, who had been in charge of the nation's internal security as police cracked down on demonstrators in Cairo's Tahrir Square, and in town and cities across Egypt, during a week of intense violence at the end of January last year.

But Mubarak was cleared of corruption charges, along with his two sons, Alaa and Gamal, who are said to have amassed a £215-million fortune during their father's rule and who still face a separate trial for insider trading.

To the fury of the crowd waiting outside the courtroom - in a former police barracks north of Cairo, protected by a phalanx of riot police - six other security officials and senior policemen were acquitted of the charges against them, and so was a property developer friend of the Mubaraks accused of offering them bribes.

For the mothers, fathers and brothers and sisters of slain protesters gathered outside, it was a moment of intense emotion when Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison - although most had wanted him hanged.

"Thank God there was justice for the people," said a middle-aged man on his knees in the dust, tears rolling down his face and a crumpled home-made poster bearing a photograph of his murdered son in his lap. Fireworks were let off and women began to ululate in celebration.

Several men jerked home-made nooses around their own necks to illustrate what they really wanted to happen to the fallen president.

But then the crowd grasped that Mubarak's henchmen, those they hold directly responsible for killing their friends and relatives, were not going to prison. The mood suddenly changed.

A young woman wailed uncontrollably. She screamed at the riot police, who had minutes earlier been eating ice cream in the hot sunshine and were soon firing stun grenades to help ward off the angry crowd.

Inside the court, Mubarak, wearing dark glasses, showed little emotion as Judge Ahmed Refaat described the popular protest that had been crushed by his regime. "It was a ray of white, bright hope for the great people of Egypt, dreaming of a better future," he said. "The people woke up from a nightmare."

His voice cracking with emotion, he added: "The protesters went out only calling for justice, freedom and democracy."

As the judge read out the verdict on behalf of the panel of judges, Mubarak listened impassively, propped up on a hospital trolley inside the bars and mesh of the metal cage where all the accused were held during court proceedings.

His sons looked dismayed as the verdicts were read out, even though they were acquitted. But many of the lawyers and spectators in the courtroom erupted with fury at the acquittal of most of those on trial. The judge said the prosecution's case lacked concrete and material evidence and had failed to prove that the protesters were killed by the police. Because those who pulled the trigger had not been arrested, he added, he could not convict any of the top police officers of complicity in the killings.

Relatives shouted that the judiciary was not independent. "The people want to liberate the judiciary," spectators cried. "Mubarak left the palace, but his dogs are still in power." Some started chanting and unfurled banners which read "God's verdict is execution". Ramadan Ahmed, whose son was killed on January 28 last year, said: "Justice was not served. This is a sham."

Many Egyptians are convinced that the army, which still runs the government and may prove reluctant to give up power even when the current presidential election has been completed, has controlled the trial behind the scenes. They fear that Mubarak's sentence will soon be reduced, since his lawyers announced their intention to appeal. In particular, there was astonishment at the acquittal of the police chiefs who were in control during the week of most intense bloodshed.

Long before the verdict, it had been clear to many that instead of justice being seen to be done, the trial was deeply flawed.

As it began last August, euphoria quickly turned to dismay amid scenes of utter chaos. Hundreds of lawyers claiming to represent Mubarak's victims argued furiously in the courtroom and even wrestled and hit each other as they struggled to address the panel of three judges and give long, grandstanding speeches. One claimed the real president had died in 2004 and insisted that the defendant was an impostor who should be subjected to a DNA test.

After that pantomime, there were delays, legal wrangles and procedural hold-ups. But what really eroded faith in the trial was the weakness of the prosecution case that was supposed to nail the former president. What was not in doubt was the scale of the bloodshed between January 25 and 31, at the height of the Arab Spring. In the side streets of Cairo, villages in the delta, and in the cities of Alexandria and Suez, hundreds of people were killed and far more injured. Paid thugs beat and kidnapped protesters, vehicles were driven into crowds at high speed to kill and maim, and snipers shot down protesters, then shot those who went to their aid.

Nearly all Egyptians, and diplomats based in Cairo, believed the violence was ordered to cow the protest movement and to show the anarchy that the government could unleash when challenged. On January 31, after intense pressure from Egypt's vital ally the United States and growing worldwide revulsion, the violence ended as abruptly as it had begun. The police vanished from the streets, and the army arrived, to be greeted as the saviours of the people - although now it in power, it is no longer seen like that.

To most Egyptians, it was pretty clear who had been responsible for the violence, but prosecutors could only sketch out a circumstantial case against Mubarak.

Some of the biggest names from the old regime, such as Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi and former vice-president Omar Soliman, told the court what had happened inside the highest circles during the tumultuous 18 days that led to Mubarak's resignation on February 11 last year.

None gave evidence that he had ordered the crackdown or directed his security forces to kill or attack protesters.

Al-Adly, interior minister at the time, who was also sentenced to life imprisonment, told the court that unknown terrorists had sneaked into the country to shoot down civilians at the behest of foreign powers.

Mubarak's own flamboyant lawyer, Farid el-Deeb, said that his client "was clean and could say no wrong" and was the victim of "slander and libel".

The uncomfortable fact, as prosecutors demanded the death penalty, was that there was no smoking gun. They could only argue weakly that, as president, Mubarak must have known what was going on - and that the killings were so extensive and widely reported that he could have stopped them sooner.

Part of the problem with that argument was that Mubarak, who at the time of the protests was suffering suspected cancer and heart problems, did not really look as if he was in control of Egypt, or perhaps even his own faculties. He relied heavily on his sons and cronies and looked desperately out of touch throughout the crisis.

Under house arrest in one of his luxurious homes, and then in Cairo's International Medical Centre where he was closely guarded, he was depressed, endlessly watching taped football matches. Sometimes he would go for a walk in the hospital's garden, striking a lonely figure.

It was a miserable ending for a man who was genuinely loved by many of his people right up to the moment when he stepped down.

His sons were accused of accepting bribes from developers. When their father ran Egypt as the family fiefdom, they controlled much of the nation's business.

The corruption charges faced by Mubarak senior were for accepting a bribe from a developer who wanted to build a golf course in the Red Sea resort town of Sharm El Sheikh, and for a corrupt deal to sell gas to Israel for prices lower than the international market rate.

Gamal, the younger and reputedly greedier son, had been Mubarak's heir apparent, and many believe he was the real power behind the throne during the president's years of decline.

Hundreds more policemen murdered and tortured for the regime during its 30 years, and crooked officials stole without restraint. Many of them are still in their jobs. There are no plans yet to put them on trial.