Expat deported for selling tobacco in Oman

Muscat: An expat was imprisoned and deported from Oman for trading prohibited commodity, Consumer Protection Authority (CPA) said.

"The Court of First Instance in Jaalan Bani Bu Hassan recently issued a judicial ruling against a defendant for violating the Consumer Protection Law issued by Royal Decree No. (66/2014) and ruled the conviction, confiscation of seizures, imprisonment and deportation from the country," CPA said in a statement.

The Consumer Protection Department in South Al Sharqiyah Governorate received a report about an expat who is storing and circulating chewing tobacco in one of the residential apartments in the wilayat. A team of judicial control officers went to the site after obtaining inspection permission from the authorities concerned. An expatriate worker was arrested and he had in his possession a large quantity of chewing tobacco.

The case was then referred to the public prosecution and then the competent court, which convicted the accused for trading a prohibited commodity and punished him with three months of imprisonment, confiscation and destruction of the seized items, deportation from the Sultanate and deprived him of entry to the country.