others eventually accepted the original rulings merely to halt what they believed would be indefinite pretrial detention and get out of prison as soon as possible. As one detainee judge had our case files in front of him. He passed our sentences without listening to our stories Nine of the 21 defendants said that court officials pressured them to give their agreement to court rulings through confessions or stamping the ruling papers with an inked copy of their fingerprints (taken as a sign of consent) without affording them the opportunity to read, review, or fully understand these judgments. One detainee deported in 2014 said that he accepted a conviction on charges of alcohol consumption and fighting after the judge told him verbally that his sentence was 10 days and 80 lashes, which he considered acceptable. He said he was later shocked to discover that the sentence also ordered his deportation, and he said he would have challenged it had he known this. He pleaded with justice officials to take back the decision to no avail. With one exception, none of the 21 Pakistani defendants in these trials had a defense lawyer largely because they did not have the resources to locate or pay a lawyer while in prison. Largely due to this lack of legal assistance, only the one detainee had possession of court documents or copies of their convictions. Some of the detainees and family members said courts would not provide these documents while others said they did not request them. Four of the detainees said that court-appointed translators did not provide adequate services, sometimes intentionally misrepresenting detainees statements to judges or failing to accurately describe the contents of Arabic-language court documents. Three defendants said that court-appointed translators misrepresented their statements to judges, which they were able to understand having learned limited Arabic living in Saudi Arabia. They said that translators told judges that defendants were pleading for forgiveness while they were actually disputing the charges or conviction. Seven of the former detainees said that they remained in prison up to eight months following the expiry of their sentences for various reasons, including apparent negligence by prison officials and slow processing of deportation procedures. 3 MARCH 2018