14 terrorists lose appeals in police officers’ murder case

The High Appeals Court has rejected the appeals of 14 men convicted of murdering two police officers in Sitra. The appellants were among 22 Bahraini nationals held guilty in connection with an explosion that targeted a police bus in Sitra on July 28, 2015, killing officers Hamed Rasool Aref and Naweed Ahmed Nazer.

Two of them were handed down the death penalty for orchestrating the attack, while five others have been sentenced to life behind bars for premeditated murder, joining a terrorist group and detonating a bomb.

Another six, including former MP Hassan Marzooq, were jailed for 10 years each for being part of the terror cell responsible for the bombing outside Gurnata Primary School for Girls. One man was jailed for five years, two were sentenced to three years in prison, another two were jailed for two years, and four defendants received six months in jail for their role in the attack. However, the court acquitted two men of all charges due to lack of proof.

Out of the 24 charged in the case, only 14 appealed the initial verdicts because the rest are at large and were tried in absentia. The first man of the two who received the death penalty is said to have received militia training in camps belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in Iran and the Iraqi branch of Hizbollah before he recruited others to the cell.