Domestic worker jailed for using employer’s mobile app to steal money

TDT | Manama

Email: mail@newsofbahrain.com

A domestic worker has been sentenced to one year in prison, fined 1,000 dinars, and ordered deported after the First High Criminal Court found she stole money from her employer using a mobile finance app and a memorised bank card PIN.

The defendant, an African national, was employed in the home of a woman in her sixties. She carried out the transfers while the employer was hospitalised, sending money to another woman.

The victim noticed a 180-dinar transfer on her phone and asked her sister to check the account. Investigators found four transfers totaling 778 dinars.

The recipient, also an African national, admitted receiving the money, apologised, and returned it, saying she accepted the sums to pass them to the defendant’s relatives. The defendant told investigators she sent the money claiming it would help renew her residence permit in Bahrain. She confessed in court.

The Public Prosecution charged that in 2025 the defendant accessed the victim’s account without lawful cause, using her bank card PIN and electronic signature, and acted in conjunction with another person who was unaware of the criminal intent, to carry out the transfers.