Dubai: A cook, who killed his co-worker for molesting his girlfriend and inviting him to bed after a private celebration will be jailed for life.

The 28-year-old Nepalese cook and his colleagues threw a private party to celebrate the promotion of one of them at the restaurant where they all worked in December.

Among the invitees was a Nepalese waiter who was drunk during the party and later tried to flirt with the cook’s Nepalese girlfriend when she went to the washroom in a flat in Al Rashidiya.

The cook heard his girlfriend shouting at the drunk waiter when he molested her and he rushed to help her.

When the 28-year-old cook tried to stop the waiter from molesting his girlfriend, the latter molested the cook and invited him to bed to have sex with him.

Outraged with the victim’s behaviour, the cook grabbed a knife from the kitchen and stabbed the waiter who dropped dead on his bed.

On Sunday, the Dubai Court of First Instance convicted the Nepalese cook of stabbing the victim to death and jailed him for life.

The accused had pleaded not guilty and denied having had any intention to kill the victim. The accused said that he acted in self-defence.

When the victim failed to show up for work, one of his colleagues went to check on him at his residence and discovered the murder.

Primary police interrogations led to the arrest of the cook and his girlfriend, who were the last two individuals seen with the deceased after the party.

When police questioned the accused, at first he denied any involvement in the murder but later admitted that he stabbed the waiter for molesting him and his girlfriend.

According to Sunday’s ruling, presiding judge Fahd Al Shamsi said the accused will be deported after serving his jail term.

A police lieutenant said they were informed about the murder when one of the victim’s co-workers went to check why he [deceased] didn’t report to work.

“A police team was dispatched to a flat in Ras Al Khor where the murder had taken place. On-site investigations revealed that a group of restaurant workers had thrown a party to celebrate a colleague’s promotion. Primary interrogations also revealed that the accused, who shared the flat with the victim, had been involved in the murder. We apprehended the accused and his girlfriend … during questioning the accused claimed that the incident happened after the waiter molested his girlfriend. He said that when he went to save his girlfriend, the victim touched him indecently and asked to have sex with him. He said he felt outraged and offended by the waiter’s behaviour and stabbed him with a knife,” the lieutenant said.

The primary judgement remains subject to appeal within 15 days.