After spending six and a half weeks in Baghdad’s infamous Rusafa jail on prices of antiquities smuggling, retired British geologist James Fitton will quickly be a free man.
An announcement launched by his household right this moment (26 July) stated, “We had been knowledgeable this morning that the appeals court docket has determined to quash the decision of the Felony Courtroom, to completely recognise Jim’s innocence on this case, and to course of his speedy launch from a 15-year jail sentence in Baghdad.”
The 66-year-old retired geologist was charged below a 2002 regulation enacted in the course of the regime of Saddam Hussein to assist stem rampant antiquities smuggling—prices that might have resulted in a dying sentence. His alleged crime was taking what his daughter Leila Fitton referred to as “a couple of nugatory items of damaged pottery” from the traditional web site of Eridu within the south of Iraq.
He apparently collected the shards with the blessing of his tour information, Geoff Hann—who later died in police custody in hospital—and below the gaze of representatives from the State Board of Antiquities and Heritage (SBAH) and native police.
In keeping with Fitton’s lawyer Thair Soud, Hann, a girl from South Africa who was his assistant and German nationwide Volker Waldman, who was a part of their tour, additionally had shards of their possession. Resulting from an error by customs officers on the airport, the South African girl was allowed to fly dwelling. Waldmann was charged however then launched, based on Soud, as a result of he informed authorities that Fitton had given him two of the stones from Eridu. Fitton was initially charged, his lawyer says, as a result of he instantly admitted to having taken the shards from the desert ground of the location as souvenirs.
Soud claims he gained the attraction for his consumer by declaring inconsistencies and errors within the consideration of proof and software of regulation.
“The stones had been out within the open and nonetheless at the moment are,” he says. “They weren’t fenced and there have been no guards. So the primary impression my consumer had was that they had been ineffective stones. In any other case, they might have been a goal for thieves and the federal government would have put them in a museum.” He provides, “The folks from the Ministry of Tourism accompanying the tour didn’t warn them to not take the stones—as a result of they had been actually nugatory shards.”
Soud says the felony court docket primarily based its verdict on a “mistake within the software of the regulation”, basing it solely on conduct—Fitton’s admission that he took the stones—and never on his “clear lack of legal intent”, evidenced, he says, by the truth that his consumer by no means made any try to hide the souvenirs he was taking dwelling. They had been discovered wrapped in tissue in Fitton’s shaving package.
Soud says he additionally requested the appeals court docket, “The place are these shards that had been confiscated from my consumer that SBAH deemed to be invaluable antiquities? Are they in a museum? In the event that they’re there, then why had been they and nonetheless are unnoticed within the open? In the event that they’re within the rubbish, then why cost an harmless particular person?”
As of press time, SBAH had not responded to a request for remark.
There isn’t a clear launch date for Fitton, who remains to be within the basic inhabitants of Rusafa jail, dwelling to Islamic State members and others. “It’s a matter of paperwork however we hope it is not going to take lengthy as my consumer has suffered lots,” Soud says.