Third: a person openly known for debauchery. His notoriety itself is a strong presumption of guilt, so he may be subjected to corporal questioning until he admits the crime; this was the position of a group of scholars.

9 – The Shaykh said: For the hand-cutting penalty to be carried out, it is not a condition that the owner of the stolen property demand its return. This is one of the narrations from Ahmad and was preferred by Abū Bakr ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz.

Ibn al-Qayyim added: The caliphs and leading jurists have consistently ruled that when the stolen goods are found with the suspect, this indication outweighs both witness testimony and confession—for the latter two are merely reports susceptible to truth or falsehood, whereas the very presence of the property with him is a decisive text that admits no doubt.