Dubai: A salesperson has been accused of groping the bottom of a housewife when she entered a store to buy textiles, heard a court on Monday.
The Frenchwoman was said to have walked into a textiles store in Naif area and was checking out the garments displayed on shelves in February.
When she was leaving the store after checking the garments, the 22-year-old Afghan salesperson, according to records, grabbed the Frenchwoman’s arm and then groped her posterior.
The shocked woman cried and rushed out of the store and called the police who apprehended the salesperson.
Prosecutors charged the suspect with groping the Frenchwoman.
The suspect pleaded not guilty when he appeared before the Dubai Court of First Instance.
“I did not grope her,” the suspect told presiding judge Urfan Omar.
The lawyer present with the suspect argued before the court: “The suspect did not intend to grope the woman. She walked into his store to check some textiles and asked him to show her an item. The suspect turned towards the shelf and climbed up on the chair to get the item … the chair on which he climbed was broken and so he slipped and fell down. He mistakenly and unintentionally touched the woman when he tried to balance himself. We ask the court to grant him bail.”
The Frenchwoman told prosecutors that she scolded the suspect and pushed him away when he groped her.
“I stormed out of the store and called the police. He groped me strongly,” she told prosecutors.
A police captain, who questioned the suspect, told prosecutors that the salesperson admitted that he apologised to woman for touching her mistakenly.
Presiding judge Omar denied the suspect’s bail request and adjourned the hearing until April 5.
