Man receives 2-year prison sentence for drug possession

AMMAN — The Court of Cassation has upheld a February State Security Court (SSC) ruling, sentencing a drug dealer to two years in prison after convicting him of possessing illegal narcotics in Madaba in July of last year.

The court declared the defendant guilty of obtaining several kinds of illicit drugs on July 26 with the intent of selling them in the local market.

The SSC handed the defendant a three-year prison term for the offence of possessing illegal narcotics and ordered him to pay JD3,000 in fines.

However, the court decided to reduce the prison term to two years and cut the fine to JD2,000 to give the defendant a second chance in life.

Court documents said the Anti-Narcotics Department (AND) received a tip-off that the defendant, along with two other defendants who did not appeal their verdicts, were known drug dealers and had possessed some illegal narcotics.

AND personnel were notified by several people that the three men “intended to sell the illegal narcotics in the local market so they monitored their movements”.

On the day of the arrest, the court documents stated, AND agents followed the defendants’ vehicle and “at a certain point attempted to pull them over”.

The defendants sped off with their vehicle and ended up crashing it, according to court transcripts.

“The AND agents were able to arrest the suspects and found a good quantity of illegal drugs in the vehicle,” the court documents said. 

The defendant contested the SSC’s ruling through his lawyer, who argued that the court “did not provide solid evidence to implicate his client”.

Meanwhile, the SSC prosecution office asked the higher court to uphold the sentence and the fine imposed on the defendant.

The higher court maintained that the SSC had followed the proper procedures in issuing the sentences against the defendant.

“It was clear to the court that the defendant confessed willingly to possessing the illegal drugs,” the higher court said.

The Court of Cassation judges presiding were Mohammad Ibrahim, Fawzi Nahar, Majid Azab, Qassem Dughmi and Hayel Amr.