TABUK, 1 March 2007 — It appears that a recent court verdict sentencing a young Saudi man to death for killing three boys and injuring two others in an accident stemming from reckless driving has caused another parent to come out asking the courts to sentence a Yemeni man to death for a similar crime.
“We wanted our son to receive good education and eventually help us financially,” said Dahir Al-Balawi in a report published yesterday in Al-Madinah newspaper. “All our hopes were gone because of a careless joy rider.”
Joy riding, as it is known, refers to a growing trend among young men to use public roads as stages for stunt driving maneuvers and high-speed racing.
Faisal Fouzan “Abu Kab” Al-Otaibi, in his 20s, was sentenced on Feb. 18 to death for a 2005 stunt that resulted in an accident with fatalities. The decision is being appealed.
Al-Balawi told the newspaper that he hopes this ruling would be a legal precedent that would establish the death penalty for accidental death caused by a negligent act involving stunt driving. He said that he hopes the Yemeni man being tried for accidentally killing his son, Bandar, 14, while he was waiting for the school to open its doors on a Sunday morning will get a death sentence.
Witnesses have said they believed that the driver was joy riding when he lost control of his vehicle and ran over the child, killing him. The driver then allegedly fled the scene of the crime, leaving Bandar struggling for life on the sidewalk.
“It is my right to expect the death penalty,” said Al-Balawi, adding that a stiff penalty may be the only effective way to dissuade young men from engaging in such irresponsible and dangerous behavior.
The attention to the joy riding phenomenon has been peaked by the Feb. 18 ruling in the Abu Kab case. (“Abu Kab” is Faisal Al-Otaibi’s nickname, which means “Cap Man,” probably because he is known among his friends to wear a baseball cap.)
The lawyer in the case, Khaled Abu Rashed, is arguing that his client did not express criminal intent to commit homicide when he lost control of his vehicle in a stunt maneuver, hitting a parked car, killing three boys and injuring two others.
On Sunday, Al-Riyadh newspaper interviewed the fathers of the victims of another joy-riding incident in 2006 that resulted in the death of two sets of two brothers who were related to each other as cousins. The suspect in that incident, who is being referred to as “Al-Hanooti” (“The Undertaker”) in the local press, is currently facing trial for the crime. The fathers in that case also expressed hope that the Abu Kab verdict will influence the trial of Al-Hanooti.
Courts occasionally punish joy riders when they are caught. In November 2005, for example, two young men — arrested for the third time in Hofuf, in the Eastern Province for joy riding — were sentenced to 20 days in jail and 50 lashes.
