A shopper at a supermarket discovered the presence of spoiled macaroni products with insects, so he only photographed and posted the videos on the social networking site, with the aim of warning and raising awareness, but he did not realize that he would be referred to trial for assaulting the privacy of others.
A court of first instance ruled his innocence, then the appeals court convicted him and punished him with a fine, so the Supreme Federal Court decided the case and decided his innocence, confirming that the elements of the crime of assault on the privacy of others are not available.
In the details, the Public Prosecution referred a defendant to the criminal trial on charges of assaulting the privacy of the "hypermarket", that pictures of "macaroni" were defective, and the clips were published on "WhatsApp", demanding that he be punished according to the articles of Decree Law No. 5 of 2012 in the matter of combating technical crimes the information.
A court of first instance in attendance ruled that the accused was acquitted of what was assigned to him, then the Court of Appeal ruled to cancel the first ruling, punish the accused by fining him 3000 dirhams, confiscating the phone used in the crime for what was assigned to him and obliging him to pay the fees.
The defendant was not satisfied with the verdict and appealed against him before the Federal Supreme Court.
The defendant’s defense said in his appeal that “the ruling erred in the application of the law when his client condemned the crime of infringing on the privacy of others without clarifying the availability of the pillars of this crime, because the incident he committed is depicting corrupt products displayed in a place with the intention of informing the official authorities concerned with monitoring Food safety and public awareness, which is a right guaranteed by law, and criminal intent, which is bad faith, is not available against him. ”
The Supreme Federal Court upheld the appeal, confirming that the text of Article 54 of the Penal Code, which had been stipulated, “No crime if the act occurred in fulfillment of a duty mandated by Islamic law or the law if the person who committed the act was authorized by law”, with the result that the legislator stipulated that a crime be committed Attacking the privacy of people: The user of the information network must have a bad intention, intending what is spreading it harms the reputation of others. Zhou feared Her assistant official authorities on the performance of its functions, the bad faith sacrificed his right and then is discharged precluded criminal intent in the crime of assault on privacy contained in the text of Article 21 mentioned above.
She stated that the incident attributed to the defendant assaulted the privacy of a supermarket to shoot videos of food products with insects and send them to the official authorities to take their affairs regarding the seizure of these products and warn the public of these products, believing that he has a legal and legal duty, so informing the official authorities is not an infringement on the privacy of people An order in which one of the pillars of the crime of attacking privacy attributed to the accused is negated, and if the ruling violates this consideration, he will have violated the law, which must be reversed.