Court of Appeal upholds ruling on salary embezzlement cases

The Court of Appeal, Second Circuit, led by Counselor Nasr Salem Al-Haid with the membership of Counselors Mutaib Al-Aradhi and Muhammad Al-Sanea, has upheld the decision to refrain from punishing female employees who received salaries while abroad.

The ruling concerns cases of alleged embezzlement within the General Administration of Private Education at the Ministry of Education. The defendants included officials and employees accused of unlawfully receiving salary payments without performing their duties during periods when they were outside the country.

According to the case details, the first defendant, an official at the Private Education Department, was accused of facilitating the third defendant’s embezzlement of 1,079 dinars between 2021 and 2023.

This involved adding work plans to justify her salary while she was absent, constituting forgery of official electronic attendance records.

The second defendant, also a public employee, was accused of enabling the fifth defendant to misappropriate 786,677 dinars and the sixth defendant to unlawfully obtain 1,298.452 dinars.

The third, fifth, and sixth defendants were accused of collaborating with the first and second defendants to commit these acts.

The Criminal Court had previously ruled to refrain from punishing the defendants, imposing a bail of 200 dinars for good conduct over one year and requiring repayment of the misappropriated amounts.

The Court of Appeal confirmed this decision, rejecting the Public Prosecution’s appeal and effectively upholding the leniency shown in the lower court’s ruling.

Separately, the Court of Appeal also addressed a different case involving two expatriates sentenced to life imprisonment for seizing over 1,043,000 dinars from a state-participated company through invoice manipulation.

The court refused to suspend the execution of the Criminal Court’s ruling and set Nov 19 to issue a verdict.

These rulings reflect a dual approach by the judiciary: upholding leniency for cases involving lower-value administrative embezzlement, while maintaining strict penalties in large-scale financial fraud cases.

The decisions underscore the courts’ commitment to both procedural fairness and accountability in public sector financial management.

The outcome has sparked discussions about the effectiveness of internal controls within public administration and the judiciary’s role in balancing punishment with rehabilitative measures for minor offenses.

Observers note that this approach may influence how future salary embezzlement and related administrative misconduct cases are handled in Kuwait.