Court of Cassation refuses to proceed with trial of theft suspect acquitted in criminal case

The Court of Cassation, in its Second Criminal Circuit, presided over by Advisor Abdullah Jasim Al-Abdullah, quashed a ruling that sentenced an accused man to five years’ imprisonment with hard labor for the crime of robbery by coercion, and rejected the Public Prosecution’s request to proceed with his trial, after his acquittal from the crime on which the prosecution relied to establish his breach of bail conditions had become final.

The incident dates back to the accusation that the defendant stole cash, sheep, and movable property, using violence and threatening the first victim with an “air rifle,” and assaulting him by beating him, which occurred at night on a public road in the Salwa area.

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In April 2023, the Criminal Court had ruled to refrain from sentencing the defendant, while ordering him to provide a bail undertaking of 300 dinars, committing him to good conduct for two years. Later, the Public Prosecution filed a request to proceed with his trial following accusations against him in a drug case during the period of the undertaking.

In June 2025, the Court of Appeal reversed its previous ruling, sentencing the defendant to five years’ imprisonment with hard labor and confiscating the bail amount, prompting him to appeal the decision before the Court of Cassation.

The defendant’s lawyer, Abdulmohsen Al-Qattan, argued that the ruling suffered from inadequate reasoning and flawed logic, as it failed to specify how his client breached the conditions of the undertaking, particularly since the incident relied upon by the Public Prosecution to prove the breach ended with a final acquittal for the defendant.

The Court of Cassation affirmed that the appealed judgment did not detail the facts and acts proving the defendant’s breach of the undertaking conditions, nor did it clearly present the evidence indicating such a breach, thereby rendering it deficient in reasoning.

It clarified that the judgment issued in the drug case definitively acquitted the defendant, and the Court found no facts presented by the Public Prosecution or documents in the case file that constituted a breach of the undertaking conditions warranting proceeding with his trial and imposing a penalty.

The Court concluded by quashing the imprisonment ruling and rejecting the Public Prosecution’s request to proceed with the defendant’s trial, while also dismissing his procedural appeal against the Court of Appeal’s ruling issued in July 2023 as inadmissible due to being filed after the statutory deadline.