For a Bounced Check in Dubai, the Penalty Can Be Years in Jail - NYTimes.com - 0 views
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For more than a year, prosecutors have been cracking down on the corruption and kickbacks that thrived during the boom years in this Persian Gulf city-state
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But alongside the con artists and crooks, a rising number of businesspeople have been sent to jail for going into debt. Bouncing a check is a criminal offense here. That fact has begun raising questions about the fairness of Dubai’s laws, especially among the foreigners who make up about 90 percent of the population.
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he criminalization of debt has put a formidable weapon in the hands of landlords, banks and other creditors, who can send someone to jail with a single document showing a check has been returned for insufficient funds. It has also complicated Dubai’s efforts to recover from the financial crisis by sending many legitimate but struggling businesspeople to jail, where they find it even harder to repay their debts.
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It's alarming how easy it is to commit a criminal offense. It is not hard to get debt or accumulate it in the business world, especially when the economy is not as good, so it's really not surprising that this could collapse Dubai's economy with the now minimal inclinations for businesses to take risks and low incentives for foreign investment.