Man jailed for consensual sex

Dubai: A man has been jailed for six months for having sex with a woman who claimed he forced her into a gym before raping her.

The 37-year-old Emirati man, I.H., had pleaded not guilty and denied luring the Spanish woman to his flat that he claimed to be a gym.

The defendant’s lawyer Shouq Al Katheri had argued before the Dubai Court of First Instance that the woman deceived I.H. and tried to blackmail him. “The woman is a charlatan. She blackmailed my client and tried to extract money [Dh15,000] from him when she malevolently and unfoundedly claimed to the police and the prosecutors that she was raped. My client did not coerce her. It was consensual,” lawyer Shouq argued.

The Spanish woman failed to testify in court.

Prosecutors quoted her as saying that the defendant pretended to be taking her to a gym that turned out to be a flat in Dubai Academic City.

“He had claimed to me that he is a fitness instructor. I met him near a school on Shaikh Zayed Road and went with him in his car to Academic City. I jogged there for a while and he drove beside me. When I asked him to take me to Al Safa or Jumeirah to work out there, he claimed that he had to return to his gym because his students were expecting him. We went up to a building and he opened the door … then he asked me to enter what he claimed to be the gym. It turned out to be residential studio. He refused my request to take me back home … he insisted on training me. He forced himself on me and raped me after he deceitfully convinced me to remove my clothes,” claimed the woman.

Lawyer Shouq contended before the court that the Spanish woman’s statement was full of contradictory details.

“Her statement was illogical. How can one believe that a flat in a residential building’s third floor is a gym? Why did she agree to enter the flat? Why didn’t she call the police or SMS her location to 999? The woman’s statement was full of fabrications. Had she been coerced and forced to accompany my client, why didn’t she call the police instead of calling a friend?” said the lawyer.

In her defence argument in court, the lawyer asked the court to acquit I.H. or modify the rape charge to consensual sex.

According to Sunday’s ruling, the court modified the rape accusation to consensual sex.

The primary ruling remains subject to appeal within 15 days.