Dubai: An employee has been jailed for six months for molesting a nine-year-old schoolgirl in a toy store after allegedly calling her aside on the pretext of teaching her yoga.
The Jordanian girl was with her parents when the family stepped into the store during a visit to a mall in October.
The nine-year-old’s parents were busy having a conversation when their daughter went around the store wanting to check out some games and disappeared for a few minutes.
Once the parents realised their child’s absence and looked around for her, they found her scared and sobbing.
The daughter told her mother that the 24-year-old Indian store employee had called her aside telling her he would teach her yoga and touched her indecently and also made her touch him.
Police apprehended the defendant shortly after the parents placed a complaint.
The Dubai Court of First Instance convicted the Indian defendant of molesting the girl and coercing her to touch his private parts.
According to the primary judgement, the defendant, who pleaded not guilty, will be deported following the completion of his punishment.
The girl’s mother said she was with her husband and daughter at the toy store when her daughter went to check out some games.
“We looked for her and when we found her she seemed petrified and cried. She told me that the accused told her that he would teach her yoga and took her aside. Then he made her raise her hands up and molested her … he also made her touch him. She told me that when he did so, she pushed him away and ran to us. We called the police,” the mother testified to prosecutors.
The girl told prosecutors that the defendant asked her to walk with him to a corner of the shop on the pretext of teaching her yoga and groped her.
The ruling remain subject to appeal.
