Twenty-two drug convicts had their jail terms reduced or replaced by fines on Thursday in light of the amendments that were introduced to the anti-narcotics law in 2016.

The Dubai Court of First Instance issued 18 new verdicts in drug cases involving 22 convicts who were earlier handed four-year jail terms [as per the previous judgements].

Presiding judge Urfan Omar reduced the jail terms in four cases [involving five convicts] to two years in jail.

In the remaining 14 cases, 17 convicts had their four-year jail terms replaced by Dh10,000 fine each as per the new amendments that were introduced to the anti-narcotics law in October last year.

The convicts in the 22 such cases taken up for hearing on Thursday were all Emirati.

The process of reducing and/or replacing the imprisonments followed the directives of Dubai’s Attorney General, Essam Eisa Al Humaidan, who had instructed drugs prosecutors to take the required action regarding those convicted of drug abuse and give them the opportunity to reform and reintegrate into society.

A chief prosecutor told Gulf News: “The process involved the defendants who had been convicted of possessing drugs for personal consumption and consuming drugs. They did not and will not include defendants who were convicted of trafficking, promoting, distributing or transporting drugs or facilitating drugs and mind-affecting substances to others. This will not be the last batch and other batches of similar cases will follow.

“The Attorney-General had earlier instructed Drugs Prosecution to re-examine judgements in all drug-related cases issued before the new law came into force [October 2016] when the use of banned substances was downgraded from a major crime [cases handled by the Court of First Instance] to an offence [cases handled by the Misdemeanours Court] and is no longer a major crime.”

Al Humaidan said earlier: “The use of illegal drugs has been downgraded to a misdemeanour and options other than jail have been provided for first-time offenders under the recent changes to the anti-narcotics law.”

The minimum four-year jail sentence has been reduced to two years, and the Attorney-General has the power to send an offender for treatment without the case going to court, after such advice from police and prosecution

source : gulfnews