Dubai: A school bus driver has been jailed for one year for making a five-year-old girl sit on his lap in the back seat and then kissing on her cheeks.
The bus’s Syrian supervisor had left the five-year-old Egyptian girl in the back seat of the bus when she took another child to drop him at his residence in January.
When she came back to the bus, she [supervisor] found the 26-year-old Pakistani driver sitting in the back with the girl and kissing her.
The Syrian supervisor then took the girl her away before she reported what she had seen to the school management.
On Wednesday, the Dubai Court of First Instance convicted the driver of molesting the schoolgirl although he had pleaded not guilty.
The accused will be deported after serving his jail term, said presiding judge Fahd Al Shamsi.
The girl told the investigating prosecutor that at first she refused to kiss the driver, who then held her up and kissed her on her cheeks.
The supervisor said the incident happened at 1pm when they were dropping the children back from school.
“When I saw him putting the girl on his lap and kissing her, I rushed and took her away from him. Then I reported it to the school management,” she told prosecutors.
The girl’s mother said when her daughter returned home, she told her that the driver came to her as she was the last student on the bus.
“Then he made her sit on his lap and planted a kiss on her cheeks,” said the mother.
The primary ruling remains subject to appeal within 15 days.
