KUWAIT CITY, Aug 22: The Appeals Court upheld the verdict of the Court of First Instance and acquitted a Kuwaiti man of charges of possessing hashish and driving a vehicle under the influence of drugs.

Case papers indicate that patrol officers on routine duty noticed a motorist driving erratically and stopped him to check his ID. They reportedly noticed that his eyes were red and he wasn’t able to talk coherently. They also learnt that the man was wanted by law and found two fingers of hashish in his possession. The officers arrested him and referred him to authorities.

Lawyer Bashar Al-Nassar argued that the officers arrested his client without any justification. He said police have the right to stop people and ask for their identification, but only if the person behaves in a suspicious manner. The lawyer claimed that his client was just standing in front of his house and so, couldn’t have roused the suspicions of officers.

Cop held: The Hawalli police have detained an unidentified policeman for stealing the cell phones of people who are in police custody, reports Al-Anba daily.
A police source said this happened when an expatriate lost a cell phone while in detention and when he attempted to file a complaint he could not do so for unknown reasons.
The expatriate then filed a complaint with the Hawalli Security Department and investigations led to the arrest of the policeman who admitted to stealing 3 iPhones from people who are in police custody.

Verdict upheld: The Court of Appeals upheld the verdict of a lower court, which had earlier acquitted five expatriates of consuming, smuggling and trading in drugs, as well as evasion of customs taxes.

Case files indicate the expatriates were caught in the act of smuggling drugs into the country through the Abdally Border.  Investigations revealed the accused also consumed and sold drugs, in addition to the non-payment of customs taxes at the border.

Attorney Abdul Mohsen Al-Qattan, lawyer for the accused, questioned the search and arrest procedures, saying the arresting officer did not obtain warrant from the Public Prosecution before carrying out the procedures.  He also raised doubt on the contradicting statements of the officer.

After carefully studying the arguments and pieces of evidence presented by both sides, the court declared the five expatriates not guilty and ordered their release.