The High Court has today overturned the 4-year jail sentence given by the Criminal Court against former President Abdullah Yameen in the lease of Vaavu Aarah.
The former President was convicted of money laundering and accepting bribes back in December of 22 and sentenced to 11 years in jail. His lawyers filed an appeal at the High Court to overturn the conviction and after months of legal wrangling, the High Court delivered its verdict on the appeal case today.
The Judges bench of the High Court agreed unanimously that the conviction made against the former President must be overturned and that the case should be retried at the Criminal Court.
The High Court judges said the appeal against the Criminal Court judgment had revealed the errors made in the trial. The judges also noted that he was deprived of many of his trial rights and that the prosecution had failed to prove that the pillars of the offense mentioned in the indictment were met.
The judgment also ruled that the Criminal Court's decision to accept the new evidence submitted by the prosecution to reject Yameen's defense evidence was wrong. Such evidence can only be admitted in exceptional circumstances and the lower court did so without necessarily stating a reasonable cause.
