Article 13 of the Saudi Penal Law on Forgery Crimes

This article protects the papers on which commercial and banking dealings rest, and covers four kinds:

• Commercial papers, such as checks, promissory notes and bills of exchange in their commonly understood sense.
• Financial papers.
• Bank papers, which Article 1 defined as the documents banks use for deposit, withdrawal or transfer from their treasury or accounts or from a customer's account, and which include documentary credits, letters of guarantee, credit cards and debit cards.
• Insurance policies.

The penalty is imprisonment of one to 5 years and a fine of up to SAR 400,000; the text combines the two without the option of imposing only one of them.

The elements of forgery in Article 1 must be present, including altering the truth in bad faith and with intent to use, and that it be capable of causing harm. The protection covers the electronic form of these papers because a document includes information technology means.

This article comes after Article 12 on a public employee's forging a document he is competent to draw up, and before Article 14 on medical reports and certificates that are contrary to the truth.

Anyone facing a dispute or accusation concerning these papers is advised to consult a lawyer who specializes in criminal cases or one who specializes in banking and finance.