Dubai: A visitor denied in court the charge of smuggling 4.9kg of hashish and blamed his friend, who had asked him to drop a gift [the drug] to another person in Dubai.
“I was doing a favour to my countryman friend, who gave me the box and claimed that it was a gift for his relative here in Dubai. I did not know that it was drugs,” said the 29-year-old Iranian when he pleaded innocent before the Dubai Court of First Instance on Wednesday.
A Customs inspector was said to have stopped the suspect, A.S., at the arrivals terminal of Dubai International Airport when he was found with hashish in the bottom of his luggage in February.
Drugs prosecutors charged A.S. with smuggling and possessing hashish.
“”Why did you carry it then?” presiding judge Fahd Al Shamsi asked the suspect.
“I did not know that it was hashish … I was doing my friend a favour and he told me that it was a gift. He did not mention anything about its contents,” replied the suspect.
When asked how much money he received for carrying the hashish, A.S. contended: “I did not take any money. I thought I was carrying a gift.”
According to records, the piece was placed in a box and covered with red pepper to hide the smell of the hashish.
The Customs inspector claimed to prosecutors that her colleague at work informed her that he suspected the contents of the suspect’s luggage and asked her to search him.
“The special scanning device revealed a thick substance placed at the bottom of the suspect’s bag. When I asked him if he was carrying any banned substances, he said no. Then he emptied the bag that contained his clothes and sweets … the device still showed something thick in the bottom of the bag. Then we broke open the bottom of the bag and found the hashish. The hashish was covered with a nylon wrap and it was covered with pieces of pepper to hide the smell. Upon confronting him with the findings, A.S. claimed that he did not know that the hashish was in the bag,” testified the inspector.
A ruling will be heard on May 11.
