PART IV - PROVISIONS RELATING TO CRIMINAL PROCEEDINGS

124 Preservation or disposal of property

(1) It shall be lawful for any Court in any criminal proceedings to make orders for :

(a) the preservation, or interim custody or detention, of any property produced in evidence or as to which any question may arise in the proceedings ;
(b) the sale, destruction or other disposal of any such property as may be of a perishable nature or liable to deteriorate, or as may be dangerous ;
(c) the restoration or awarding of possession of any such property to the person appearing to the Court to be entitled to possession thereof, without prejudice however to any civil proceedings which may be taken with respect thereto ;
(d) the payment by any person of the expense incurred in or about the preservation, custody, detention, sale, destruction or other disposal of any such property or the proceeds thereof ;
(e) the application of any such property or the proceeds thereof, in or towards satisfaction or payment of any such costs or compensation as may be ordered by the Court to be paid by any person.
Any order made under the provisions of paragraph (d) of the last preceding subsection may be enforced as if the order were the imposition of a fine.

Where an order is made under the provisions of this section in a case in which an appear lies, such order shall not, except where the property is liable to deterioration or decay or is dangerous, be carried out until the period allowed for presenting an appeal has passed or, where an appeal is presented within that period, until the appeal has been determined.

125 Property stolen to be restored to owner

(1) If any person guilty of any such offence as is mentioned in Chapters XXXVI to XLIV, inclusive, of the Criminal Code 1899, by stealing, taking, obtaining, extorting, converting or disposing of, or by knowingly receiving, any property, is prosecuted to conviction by a public prosecutor or by or on behalf of the owner of that property, or is found guilty on any such prosecution but is discharged under the provisions of any written law without conviction, the property shall be restored to the owner or his representative.

(2) In every case referred to in the preceding subsection, the Court before which any such offender is convicted, or discharged without conviction, shall have power to award from time to time writs of restitution for the property or to order the restitution thereof in a summary manner :
Provided that :

(a) where goods as defined in the Sale of Goods Act 1893 of England in its application to Nauru have been obtained by fraud or other wrongful means not amounting to stealing, the property in those goods shall not revest in the person who was the owner of the goods, or his personal representative, by reason only of the conviction of the offender ; and
(b) nothing in this section shall apply to the case of any valuable security which has been in good faith paid or discharged by some person liable for the payment thereof or, being a negotiable instrument, has been in good faith taken or received by transfer or delivery by some person for a just and valuable consideration without any notice or without reasonable cause to suspect that the same had been stolen.

(3) The operation of any order under this section shall, unless the Court before which the conviction or discharge takes place directs to the contrary in any case in which the title to the property is not in dispute, be suspended :
(a) in any case until the time allowed for presenting an appeal has passed, and
(b) in a case where an appeal is presented, until the determination of the appeal ;
and, in cases where the operation of any such order is suspended until the determination of the appeal, the order shall not take effect as to the property in question if the conviction is quashed on appeal, unless the Supreme Court so directs. The Chief Justice may make provision by rules for securing the safe custody of any property pending the suspension of the operation of any such order.

(4) Any person aggrieved by an order made under this section by the District Court may appeal to the Supreme Court and upon the hearing of any such appeal the Court may by order annul or vary any order made on a trial for the restitution of any property to any person, even though the conviction or order of discharge is not quashed ; and the order, if annulled, shall not take effect and, if varied, shall take effect as so varied.

PART IV - PROVISIONS RELATING TO CRIMINAL PROCEEDINGS

127 Restoration of possession of real property

(1) Where a person is convicted of an offence attended by criminal force, threat or intimidation and it appears to the Court that by such force, threat or intimidation any person has been dispossessed of any real property, the Court may, if it thinks fit, order possession of that property to be restored to the person so dispossessed.

(2) Any order under this section may be enforced by warrant addressed to a police officer.

(3) No such order shall prejudice any right or interest to or in the real property which any person may be able to establish in a civil suit or in proceedings before the Nauru Lands Committee.