The former managing director of Leeds United has been acquitted in the United Arab Emirates of criminal charges relating to a tweet.
David Haigh has said he hopes to be reunited with his family for Easter after spending nearly two years in custody in Dubai.
Mr Haigh was due to be released in November last year after being convicted of fraud, but was charged with a further offence of slander in relation to comments made on Twitter while he was in jail.
He will now be freed after being in custody since May 2014.
Ian Monk, Mr Haigh's spokesman, said: "David is delighted that the nightmare of almost two years in jail, which began when he was tricked into flying to Dubai on the pretext of being offered a new job, is now coming to an end.
"David now hopes to be reunited with his family in the UK for Easter. He will have more to say then."
Mr Haigh has been in custody in Dubai since he was arrested and accused of stealing around £3.6 million from his former employer, and Leeds United's former owner, Gulf Finance House (GFH) Capital.
The investment bank claimed Mr Haigh had falsified invoices and diverted money into accounts controlled by him.
Mr Haigh, the former deputy chief executive of the bank, denied the charges and said he had been "lured" to Dubai under false pretences.
He said he believed he was travelling to Dubai for a meeting to discuss money owed to him, including for the sale of the football club, and a potential new role for him in London.
His assets were frozen worldwide during his time in custody.
In August 2015, Mr Haigh was convicted of misappropriating items of monetary value from a position of trust from his former employer and was sentenced to two years in prison.
He was due to be released on November 16 but, two days earlier, he was charged with "cyber slander" of his former business partner in relation to comments on his Twitter account made eight months previously when he was in custody.
Mr Haigh denied the allegations, which occurred at a time when he was in prison with no access to the account, which was being handled by a third party.
Joe Stork, the deputy Middle East director of non-governmental organisation Human Rights Watch, previously called for Mr Haigh to be released, saying: "If UAE businessmen can have their partners locked up when they don't like the tone of their tweets, one has to question whether the UAE is a safe place to make any form of criticism."
GFH Capital bought Leeds United from Ken Bates in December 2012.
Mr Haigh introduced current owner Massimo Cellino to GFH Capital during his time as managing director at the club, but resigned shortly after the Italian had completed his takeover.
The businessman resigned from his position as deputy chief executive of GFH Capital in March 2014.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article