Bahrain’s High Criminal Court sentenced a man in his forties to five years in prison and a BD3,000 fine for promoting narcotic drugs.[1] The case began when the Anti-Narcotics Directorate received information that the defendant held drugs for promotion.[1] Police assigned a secret source to buy hashish, and the source called the defendant by phone in a policeman’s hearing, agreeing to buy about BD80 worth.[1] The source went with a policeman to the agreed place, and the defendant handed over a dark-coloured piece that a laboratory confirmed was hashish.[1]

The arrest force then raided the defendant, who tried to flee, and detained him.[1] In Public Prosecution investigations, he confessed to holding the seized material for resale.[1] He said he had agreed that day to sell the hashish for about BD80 and handed it over at the appointed time, having obtained it through a dead drop, a secret spot where something is left for collection without the two sides meeting.[1]

Prosecutors charged him with supplying hashish for use for payment outside the cases licensed by law, and with possessing and holding hashish outside the cases permitted by law.[1]