Dubai: A sports coach and a typist have been jailed for one year each for stealing items worth Dh2,400 from a garment store at a mall and hiding them inside a guitar.
The Moroccan sports coach, Y.M., and his countryman typist, Z.M., walked into the store as customers, removed the price tags from items with a pair of scissors and a nail-cutter and hid those items inside the guitar in August.
Security guards stopped Y.M. and Z.M. from leaving the store once they spotted them trying to walk out carrying the stolen items.
The Dubai Court of First Instance convicted Y.M. and Z.M. of attempted theft.
Presiding judge Urfan Omar said the defendants will be deported following the completion of their punishments.
“The nail-cutter and scissors will be confiscated,” said presiding judge Omar.
Y.M. pleaded not guilty unlike Z.M. who pleaded guilty.
Y.M. and Z.M. attempted to rob 12 items of clothing and sports shoes and four other outfits.
“I did not steal anything,” Y.M. told the court.
A Nigerian security guard said he stopped the two accused while leaving the store since he had been watching them after he suspected them.
“I stopped them and told them that I had to search them. I found nearly 16 items hidden inside the guitar box without tags … they untagged them so that the alarm does not go off. Y.M. had kept inside the guitar box a pair of scissors and a nail-cutter that the defendants had used to remove the tags and bar codes. I informed my supervisor who reported the matter to the police,” he testified.
The duo were quoted as admitting to prosecutors that they tried to take the items without paying for them.
The primary ruling remains subject to appeal within 15 days.
