A university student, who was convicted in two separate cases of stealing money from relatives who entrusted him with their finances, has lost an appeal against his most recent guilty verdict.
In May last year, the 21-year-old Bahraini was found guilty of stealing more than BD24,000 from his aunts, and in November he was found guilty of swindling BD4,000 in benefits from his grandmother’s bank account.
The High Criminal Court sentenced him to six months in prison and fined him BD1,000 in both cases, amounting to a total of one year behind bars and a BD2,000 fine.
The young man appealed both digital fraud convictions at the Supreme Criminal Appeals Court, but has lost his appeal in the now-deceased grandma’s case.
The GDN earlier reported that the appellant took advantage of the 80-year-old woman’s age to siphon off her widow’s social support allowance, late grandfather’s retirement salary and inflation compensation.
Four of the widow’s children, including the two aunts the defendant defrauded, testified against their nephew and accused him of emptying out their mother’s bank account.
They told prosecutors that while their mum was still alive, the grandson took her to the bank and made her sign papers allowing him to access her funds in order to take them for himself.
The appellant denied charges of accessing another person’s bank account without their consent and taking their money through deceitful means, claiming that his grandma would give him money of her own accord to support his car re-selling side hustle.
However, she can neither verify nor refute his claim as she has since died.
In his appeal in the aunts’ case, his lawyer claimed in court that the appellants’ aunts and uncles were framing him ‘as a form of retaliation’ as they ‘have a problem’ with his dad.
He claimed that the complaint against his client was made maliciously as part of a conspiracy against his father, and described his uncle as “a man who wants to not only ruin my future but also break up our family”.
Meanwhile, in the last trial, the Bahraini man was found guilty of manipulating data for malicious ends, taking BD12,725 from the elder aunt and BD11,577 from the younger aunt from 2020 until his fraud was discovered in 2023.
The sisters had entrusted their nephew with a full power of attorney to help them with paperwork due to their poor health, but he reportedly took advantage of their age and medical conditions.
zainab@gdnmedia.bh
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