David Morrison v. State of Uttarakhand
2021 (1) Crimes 230 (Uttar.)
In the High Court of Uttarakhand
M.C.R.C. 139/2021 & B.A. 721/2020
Before Justice Alok Kumar Verma
Decided on May 11, 2021

Relevancy of the case:  Bail application by a foreigner in a case involving phishing

Statutes and Provisions Involved

• The Information Technology Act, 2000 (Section 66)
• The Indian Penal Code, 1860 (Section 420, 120B)
• The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (Section 439, 441, 445)
• The Foreigners Act, 1946 (Section 14)

Relevant Facts of the Case

• The accused (David Morrison) along with the co-accused fraudulently took ₹25 lakhs while residing in India without a valid passport and visa.
• The two accused then lured people with false claims of winning a lottery worth five lakh Pounds by sending SMS on behalf of the Coca-Cola company.
• In this case, they filed a bail application under Section 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
• The lower court rejected the bail application as the accused could not arrange sureties, and offered a cash deposit in lieu of a security bond.

Opinion of the Bench

• Even if the bail applicant is a foreigner and cannot furnish sureties under Section 445 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, that does not prohibit them from being admitted to bail.

Final Decision

• The court granted bail to the applicant.

T S VS Nivedita, a postgraduate student at O.P. Jindal University, prepared this case summary during her association with The Cyber Blog India in January 2022.