Criminal cases filed at Public Prosecution up by 14.5% in 2022

Muscat: The Public Prosecution authority said that the number of criminal cases filed at its departments rose by 14.5 percent to 32,277 cases in 2022, compared to 2021.

This was unveiled during the Public Prosecution’s annual conference held on Tuesday under the title “In the Name of Society”. Various indicators and statistics from last year were reviewed.

Attorney General Nasr Khamis Al Sawa’ee said, “Publishing verdicts and names of persons involved is considered part of complementary penalties, and in some cases as secondary penalties. Publication of the same in the media is conducted under judicial ruling.”

He added that 13 murder cases were reported last year and that a working team from the Ministry of Social Development was formed, in cooperation with the Public Prosecution department, to study each case separately.

Al Sawa’ee advised all to report any criminal case or suspicion of the same via proper, official channels to the departments concerned. He affirmed that each report or complaint is dealt with secretly.

In his turn, Dr. Ahmed Said Al Shukaili, Deputy Attorney General, said that the Public Prosecution department conducted more than 60,000 minutes of investigation, among them some 6,000 conducted in the evening session and about 7,000 via online investigation. Nearly 150,000 judicial order were issued by the Public Prosecution department, of them more than 40,000 issued in the evening session, Al Sawa’ee added.

He pointed out that murder crimes constitute a deep social concern, particularly the repeated use of knives or ‘white arms’, though the number of murders in 2022 and 2021 was the same with 13 murders.

He said that the Public Prosecution department is liaising with the authorities concerned to investigate the causes.

“Cheques without balance” topped the list of the most common 10 crimes, followed by residency law violation, labour law violation, the use of narcotics and psychotropic substances, IT crimes, consumer law violation crimes, crimes of violation of human dignity, theft, extortion of money, swindling and traffic law violation.

As many as 30,543 cases of juvenile delinquency were reported last year, 14.7 percent higher than 2021 figures, while felonies rose by 9.8 percent to 1,378 as against 2021 figures. 

The Public Prosecution department cleared 97 percent of cases filed last year. It referred 19,558 cases to the designated courts and reserved 11,687 cases, Al Shukaili said.

He explained that the number of registered suspects stood at 40,113 last year, 15 percent higher than 2021 figures, adding that expatriate suspects constituted 42.3% of the total number of accused persons.

As many as 13,155 cases were registered in Governorate of Muscat (40.8%---the highest), while 188 cases were reported in the Governorate of Musandam—the lowest, at 0.6%.

Al Shukaili stressed that there is continuous follow-up of fake accounts that spread rumours via social communication channels. It was found that most of the rumours were transmitted from outside Oman, said Al Shukaili, who laid emphasis on the significance of social awareness as a means of combating such rumours.

Al Shukaili pointed out that cases reported to the Public Funds and Money Laundering Department dropped to 43 last year, noting that the total number of recovered funds stood at OMR12,418,971.

The Public Prosecution department kept 982 cases under investigation until the end of last year.