Bahrain Mirror: Attorney General Ali Al-Buainain announced that the Bahraini Public Prosecution began to implement the provisions of the Penal Code and alternative measures. Following the conclusion of the law enforcement mechanisms by the issuance of regulatory orders, the Public Prosecution issued the Guidance Regulations on law enforcement. Which was issued by the Public Prosecutor's Office pursuant to Attorney General's Order No. 1 of 2018.

The Prosecution presented the deprivation of freedom sentences issued against eleven female defendants to the sentencing judge to issue alternative penalties. The judge ordered the defendants be sentenced to penalties alternative to imprisonment, which vary between community service and rehabilitation and damage correction programs. They have been released and the rules and legal controls for the implementation of the alternative punishments have been implemented.

On the importance of the Alternative Punishments and Measures Law, the Attorney-General said that the Alternative Punishments and Measures Law were an important qualitative leap and is considered a decisive treatment by the Bahraini legislator of the many problems raised by practical implementation, some of which relate to the defendant's personal circumstances and others to the suitable grounds for the selection of appropriate measures. He added that it also came in line with international legislations and experiences that proved to be a tangible success. The new law decided on other kinds of penalties to give the judge more space for his considerations, to choose alternatives to the punishment of deprivation of freedom if necessary and called for by factual and personal circumstances. He further said that it also allowed the prosecution as well as the judge, instead of holding the accused in pretrial detention, to order the implementation of any of the measures provided for in this law against the accused. All of which are subject to the restrictions laid out in the law without affecting the course of justice.

He explained that the law as such offers the judge additional options in determining a punishment alternative to the penalty of deprivation of freedom, and gives him and the Public Prosecution the opportunity to impose alternative measures to pretrial detention and this would in turn reduce the overcrowding of prisons with defendants that could have been merely watched and prevented from going to certain places to avoid any problems leading to crime.

Arabic Version