Dubai: A manager, who followed a woman shopper to her car after she refused his offer to help carry her goods and groped her, has been jailed for three months.
The 48-year-old Turkish manager bumped into the Austrian shopper at a hypermarket’s cashier when he offered to help her carry her groceries in November.
The 40-year-old Austrian woman refused the man’s offer and continued walking to her car before he came from behind and groped her while she was putting her purchases in the trunk.
Two months after being identified through CCTV cameras at the shopping mall in Jebel Ali, police detained the defendant.
The Dubai Court of First Instance convicted the manager of molesting the Austrian although he had pleaded innocent. “I did not touch her,” he told the court.
Presiding judge Urfan Omar said the accused will be deported after serving his punishment.
The woman said the incident happened at 1.30pm shortly before she had finished shopping and was about to pick her children from school.
“When the accused offered to help me carry the purchases to my car, I refused. When I started putting the goods in the rear trunk, the defendant approached me from behind. He asked me if I wanted to date him. I explained to him that I was married. Then he groped me and ran away. I picked up my children from school, and then reported the matter to the police. In January the police summoned me to the police station to identify the defendant who had been arrested,” she testified.
A police corporal said the Turkish man was summoned to the police station after they identified his workplace.
“During questioning, the defendant claimed that he had met the shopper at the cashier and offered to help her carry her purchases to her vehicle,” he testified.
The accused told prosecutors that he constantly offers to help shoppers [men and women] who might require assistance to carry their purchases to their cars.
The primary ruling remains subject to appeal within 15 days.
