A private nurse has taken to the appeals court after she was sentenced to a total of 15 years in prison for stealing BD25,700 from a disabled elderly patient, then laundering the stolen funds.
The 30-year-old Indian woman was found guilty in two separate trials. She recently lost her appeal in the theft trial, which carried a 10-year sentence, but has now lodged an appeal against the money laundering conviction.
The nurse’s lawyer claimed that no money laundering occurred, since the appellant spent the money on jewellery, goods, personal expenses and paying off loans, transferring the rest to her husband in India.
“Legally, there is difference between utilising money gained through committing a crime to personally spend and benefit from, and behaving in a way that can be considered money laundering,” read the defence memo. “The verdict did not specify how her use of the money went beyond personal gain, to enter the territory of criminalised money laundering.
“The fact that the money was transferred internationally cannot be used as conclusive evidence to prove laundering occurred, unless it is supported by other evidence. On its own, spending funds on personal purchases, debts and jewellery does not comprise money laundering.”
The GDN previously reported that the nurse used her 79-year-old patient’s mobile phone to transfer BD25,700 from his online banking account to herself in order to settle debts in India.
In March, she was convicted in the theft trial, and sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined BD5,000.
In July, she was found guilty of laundering BD22,250 – part of the amount she had stolen – after she returned BD3,500 to the victim. She was also fined BD100,000 and ordered to repay the BD22,250, which may be recovered from her assets and properties.
In both trials, the court ordered her deportation upon completion of her sentence. In the second trial, the court heard that the Indian woman laundered part of the stolen money that she was unable to repay.
Court documents stated that she transferred BD22,051 to her husband’s bank account in India through four international wire transfers. She spent the remaining funds on food, jewellery and financial trading platforms.
The case came to light when the victim’s 49-year-old son discovered that large sums of money had been withdrawn from his father’s bank account in September and October 2025.
After tracing the movement of the funds, he reportedly found that they had been transferred to the bank account of the nurse caring for his medically-dependent father.
According to the son, his father had undergone a tracheotomy two years earlier – a procedure in which an opening is made in the throat to insert a tracheal tube that enables a patient to breathe without using the nose or mouth.
The nurse was paid a monthly salary of BD300 to administer the elderly Bahraini’s medications, maintain his ventilator and change his clothes. As the defendant failed to make full restitution, the son reported the matter to the authorities.
In the first trial, the woman was found guilty of using the victim’s electronic signature – a one-time password (OTP) – for her own benefit to gain unauthorised access to his online banking account and steal the funds. Prosecutors previously accused her of ‘exploiting the victim’s condition and lack of mobility’ to carry out the theft, as the elderly man was bedridden and had difficulty speaking following the throat surgery.
The court set September 29 as the date an appeals verdict will be issued in the case.
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