Article 28 of the Saudi Emergency Law

This article sets out the relationship between the Emergency Law's penalties and other penalties, providing that the penalties in the Law or in emergency orders do not prejudice two things:

1. The hadd penalties prescribed by Sharia: if an act calls for a hadd penalty under Sharia, the Emergency Law's penalties do not prevent it from being carried out.
2. The more severe penalties in any other law: if the same act is punishable in another law by a more severe penalty, this Law's penalties do not prevent that more severe penalty from being applied.

The importance of this appears when it is read with Article 27, which sets the penalty for violating the Law at up to one year in prison or a fine of up to SAR 100,000, or both, and the penalty for violating emergency orders as what the order states, failing which up to 6 months in prison or a fine of up to SAR 50,000, or both. These limits are not an absolute ceiling if the act calls for a more severe penalty under another law or a hadd penalty.

The purpose of this provision is that a state of emergency should not become a reason for lighter punishment of serious acts. A person may commit during a state of emergency an act that is at once a violation of an emergency order and a serious crime under another law, and the lighter emergency penalty is not then treated as sufficient.

The article does not explain how to combine penalties in each case, and does not name the other laws intended. Article 29 follows, subjecting the public criminal action in these crimes to the Law of Criminal Procedure and making the Public Prosecution responsible for investigating them. Anyone facing an accusation connected to a state of emergency can consult a lawyer who specializes in criminal cases.