Kuwait Court of Cassation principle number 118

Summary: - Customs Administration employees whom Law No. 10 of 2003 grants judicial law-enforcement status, within their competence, while performing their work, may inspect goods and search persons and what travelers carry or what belongs to them within the customs area and other places specified in that Law if they suspect that the person has committed or attempted to commit a smuggling offense or transported or possessed smuggled goods. They may use any means to assist them, such as technical equipment and trained animals. - The arrest and search restrictions prescribed in the Criminal Procedure and Trials Law need not be satisfied for detecting smuggling offenses. What suffices for this. Discovery during a search of evidence revealing a non-customs offense punishable under general law. It may validly be relied upon before the courts. Reason: it emerged during a procedure lawful in itself, and no violation was committed to obtain it. - Suspicion of customs smuggling. A mental state arising in the person entrusted with enforcing customs laws that rationally permits a presumption of smuggling by a person within the customs control area. Its assessment belongs to the person conducting the search, under the trial court’s supervision. Rule: Examination of Articles 60, 116/2, 125, 126 of Law No. 10 of 2003 promulgating the Common Customs Law of the States of the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf shows that the legislature granted Customs Administration employees judicial law-enforcement status while performing their work, within their competence. For the purpose of investigating and combating smuggling, they may inspect goods and search persons and what travelers carry or what belongs to them within the customs area and other places specified in that Law if they suspect that the person has committed or attempted to commit a smuggling offense or transported or possessed smuggled goods. They may use any means assisting them in performing their work, such as technical equipment, trained animals, or otherwise. In view of the nature of customs smuggling, its direct connection with the interests and resources of the public treasury, and the respect due to restrictions regulating imports and exports, the legislature did not require, in respect of persons, satisfaction of the arrest and search restrictions regulated by the Criminal Procedure and Trials Law or require that the person to be searched be in one of the situations justifying a search within the legal understanding of the principles established in that Law. Rather, it suffices that the employee charged with surveillance and searches in those areas encounters circumstances indicating suspicion of customs smuggling within the limits defined by law for his right to investigate it to arise. If, during the search he conducts, he discovers evidence revealing a non-customs offense punishable under general law, that evidence may validly be relied upon before the courts in respect of that offense, because it emerged during a procedure lawful in itself and no violation was committed to obtain it. Suspicion of customs smuggling is a mental state arising in those entrusted with enforcing customs laws that rationally permits a presumption of smuggling by a person within the customs control area. Its assessment belongs to the person conducting the search, under the trial court’s supervision. That being so, the challenged judgment adhered to this view in answering the appellant’s plea that the arrest and search were invalid on the allegation that none of the situations prescribed by law existed. It concluded that those procedures were justified and that the search was conducted within the bounds of procedural legality, and rejected her plea of their invalidity. The judgment’s conclusion accords with the correct application of the law. Accordingly, it cannot be faulted for relying in its ruling upon the evidence yielded by those procedures, and the appellant’s complaint against the judgment in this respect is unsound.