Dubai: Prosecutors lost their appeal against a visitor who was cleared of hugging an 11-year-old boy, kissing and making the boy touch him indecently when he was walking to his home.

In July, the Dubai Court of First Instance acquitted the 28-year-old Pakistani visitor of molesting the 11-year-old Indian schoolboy who was returning home after a private lesson at a house close to his residence in December.

The man was said to have hugged the boy, according to records, and made him touch his private parts before the boy pushed the man away and ran to his house.

Prosecutors appealed the primary judgement before the Appeal Court and sought to have his acquittal replaced by an imprisonment.

Presiding judge Saeed Salem Bin Sarm rejected prosecutors appeal and confirmed the man’s acquittal citing lack of insufficient evidence.

The boy’s father was believed to have been shocked when his son told him about what had reportedly happened but did not report the matter to the police.

After the boy’s mother returned from vacation in India, she came to know about her son’s ordeal and later she heard from neighbours that another boy was also molested. Then, the family reported the matter to the police in January 2017.

When he defended himself in court, the man denied hugging, kissing and making the boy touch him indecently.

“This is a fabricated case lodged against me out of malice,” he said in court.

The boy was alleged to have told prosecutors that his father did not report the matter to the police initially.

“When our neighbour got molested in January, they reported to the police and my parents also informed the police,” the boy claimed.

The mother alleged to prosecutors that her husband was too shocked to report the matter to the police.

“When we came to know after two weeks that our neighbour’s child had been molested, we reported the matter to the police. My son identified the suspect from a line-up of suspects,” she was quoted as saying in her testimony.

The appellate ruling remains subject to appeal before the Cassation Court.