Wednesday
30th Oct 2024
Dhivehi Edition
Nazim Sattar, the brother of former president Mohamed Nasheed, has been sentenced to 3 months and 26 days in house arrest for engaging in homosexual acts with MD Alamgiri, a Bangladeshi national.
Nazim was initially sentenced to jail time of 1 month and 28 days, however, he was given clemency under the penal code to offer a punishment of the same caliber. Therefore, the constitution allows changing one month of jail time to two months of house arrest. Nazim was then sentenced to two months in addition to the 1 month and 28 days of imprisonment.
Nazim was charged with “Unlawful Sexual Intercourse” under the second point of Article 411(a) and the first point of Article 411(b). The Penal Code dictates that Nazim’s crime was a Class 5 felony considering that he was married while he participated in same-sex sexual intercourse.
The Prosecutor General’s Office chose to prosecute Nazim under the penal code as an alternative to the sexual offense law ensuring a lighter punishment. Prosecuting under the penal code brings a maximum of 9 months and 18 days of imprisonment on them for their offense, while the sexual offenses act would have incarcerated them for a period of five to seven years.
Alamgiri, who was also prosecuted under Article 411 of the Penal Code was sentenced to seven months in jail as he had confessed to his crime to strike a plea deal.
According to Article 1106 of the Penal Code, if an offender acknowledges guilt and expresses genuine remorse before trial, his baseline sentence will be mitigated two levels.