DAMMAM, 22 January — A Bahraini criminal court has handed down a six-month jail sentence to a Saudi who was found guilty of causing a road accident last April in which a woman was killed.
The court found the Saudi guilty of driving in the wrong lane, of being drunk while driving, of fleeing the scene of an accident, and of damaging other cars — in addition to accidentally killing the 36-year-old Bahrain woman who died in the accident.
According to the prosecution, the Saudi sped his car along Sheikh Isa ibn Salman Road — leading to the King Fahd Causeway, which links the Kingdom with Bahrain — on the morning of April 12 last year. His erratic driving made the woman’s car swerve and ram onto another car.
The court found that the Saudi’s negligence of traffic rules was the cause the accident. The convicted driver will be set free after serving the term in full, said Isa Al-Burashid, the lawyer representing the Saudi. Since the Saudi has already spent over six months in jail waiting for the verdict, Al-Burashid continued, he will be able to return home after the completion of the administrative formalities.
In another road accident reported from Manama last month a drunken Saudi driver, who was driving in the lane for on-coming traffic, killed two other Saudis. The driver is in police custody as the case is being investigated.
