Court denies Sealife MD's release request

Criminal Court has denied the release request of Sealife Global's Ahmed Moosa Mohamed, keeping him detained for the duration of his trial on fraud charges.

While the lower court had back in June ordered the Sealife managing director's release, High Court ordered him to be kept in custody following an appeal by the state. He asked the Criminal Court to review this, seeking to be released under four conditions.

At the hearing, the state argued that Mohamed could attempt to flee; 14 court orders were issued for his arrest during the investigation stage, he had already fled the country.

Mohamed was arrested from neighboring Sri Lanka with the assistance of Interpol after nearly two years in hiding, and extradited back to Maldives on March 24.

After hearing both sides, the judge decided against releasing the Sealife owner. He said that the court has received enough evidence to determine him a flight risk.

Ahmed Moosa Mohamed has been charged with 42 counts of criminal offences after scamming hundreds of people using housing fraud, with up to 65 years of imprisonment if convicted.

Sealife Global was tasked with developing 3,000 housing units. It is accused of scamming a number of people, after taking the initial payment for the apartments allocated within the first phase. Cases against Sealife were filed at the police and the Civil Court, with the presidential commission on corruption and asset recovery launched an investigation into the housing scam in March.

While nine of the witnesses in the case are former employees at the company, the state noted that Mohamed could try to influence him if released from custody as he used to have a close relationships with his employees.