Cassation Court upholds over 3 years' sentence for drug dealer

AMMAN — The Court of Cassation has upheld a February 2023 State Security Court (SSC) ruling, sentencing a drug dealer to over three years in prison after convicting him of possessing illegal narcotics in Zarqa in September 2022.

The court declared the defendant guilty of obtaining illegal narcotics with the intent of selling the narcotics in the local market.

The SSC handed the defendant five years in prison for the offence of possessing illegal narcotics and ordered him to pay JD5,000 in fines.

However, the court decided to reduce the fine to JD3,500 and the prison term to three years and four months to give the defendant a second chance in life.

Court documents said the Anti-Narcotics Department (AND) learned that the defendant, along with two other men who were convicted in the same case but did not appeal their verdicts, were buying illegal drugs to sell in the local market.

 On September 30, the court maintained, AND officers decided to raid the defendant’s house.

“The AND officers found a variety of illegal drugs including Captagon, Hashish and other illegal narcotics,” the court said.   

The defendant contested the SSC’s ruling through his lawyer, who argued that he was “subjected to duress to confess”.

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 sentence against the defendant.

“It was clear to the court that the defendant confessed willingly to possessing the illegal drugs and that he was selling illegal narcotics to six to eight people on a daily basis,” the higher court said.

The Court of Cassation judges were Mahmoud Ebtoush, Fawzi Nahar, Majid Azab Ibrahim Abu Shamma and Mohammad Shreiri.