Public Prosecution smuggling oil products

The head of Public Prosecution for Government Ministries and Public Institutions, Mamdouh Al-Ma'aoudeh, emphasized that the Public Prosecution has received since 2006 and up the present day seven cases lodged against smuggllers of government-subsidized oil products, investigated into these cases, dealt with all of them and referred them to the competent criminal court. Six of these cases have been adjudicated in favor of conviction of the accused compliance with the provisions of the GCC Consolidated Customs and Tariffs Law. The court verdicts varied from six months to one year incarceration and fines from BD 3,000 to more than BD 35,000 plus confiscation of substances caught. Only one case ended up in the court's acquittal of the accused. The Public Prosecution impugned this verdict before the competent court of appeal. Al-Ma'aoudeh said that, in view of increasingly growing number of crimes of smuggling of government-subsidized oil products out of the Kingdom of Bahrain, being committed by poor souls who would like to exploit diesel price differences locally and internationally and gain illegal cash, and because the Public Prosecution paid attention to such cases, a special prosecution has been set up for such crimes, known as the Public Prosecution for Government Ministries and Public Institutions, in order to work full time, conduct prompt investigations, retain substances caught in order to confiscate them, pinpoint the accused and refer them to the competent Urgency Criminal Court and follow up the judgments issued versus the accused and appeal any judgments it deems necessary to appeal or impugn. Al-Ma'aoudeh asserted that such crime of smuggling oil products inflicts damage onto the Kingdom's national economy in view of the heavy cost incurred by the Kingdom's state budget in subsidizing these products for the purpose of alleviating the onus off the shoulders of Bahraini citizens and providing them with necessities of livelihood in consideration for lesser prices.