Lord Macdonald, formerly the director of public prosecutions, points out that "it is difficult to imagine a broader concept than causing 'nuisance' or 'annoyance'".
Despite the red-top outrage engendered by such examples of "draconian Islamic laws", the whimsical nature of such prosecutions points towards a perennial problem for those living in all the Gulf states: fundamental difficulties with the rule of law coupled with a legal process that is opaque, capricious and lacking in equality.
David Hanson MP, Labour's shadow immigration minister, said that the government needed to focus on prosecutions, pointing to the last government report which identified 946 potential victims of human trafficking, but "only eight convictions".
His depravity, from a prosecution point of view, went unexplained until the arrival in New York of the Chicago Tribune for Saturday, June 9th, which, in a story about the jurors, carried the subhead "Son of Professor".
Mr Bo himself, sometimes with help from his lawyers, insisted on challenging the prosecution point by point, and on cross- examining prosecution witnesses.The decision to give Mr Bo's trial such publicity is all but certain to have been taken by the Chinese leadership.
He proceeded to complain that practically everything written or said about Mosley in recent years had been from the prosecution point of view, adding that the time had come 'for one to be able to view his life and the causes he espoused in both detachment and sympathy'.
Elwen Evans QC, for the prosecution, pointed out that he had then put her outside in the cold.
The motive seemed to be benefit fraud, but the killers had a particular loathing for homosexuals and paedophiles, the prosecution pointed out helpfully.
Television channels wrap up each week at the tribunal, and programmes reuniting families separated by decades of war are popular.School curriculums now teach the Khmer Rouge era, and as Craig Etcheson, a former chief investigator for the prosecution, points out, parents are no longer afraid to talk to their children about the horrors that took place when the Maoists came to power.
As the court prosecution pointed out, Mr Gilroy, who was the one person with intimate knowledge of Ms Pilley, had gone on a journey of "no importance" the day after she had disappeared instead of "assisting the police inquiry".
