Dubai: Prosecutors lost their appeal against a visitor who was cleared of hitting his roommate in the face with a screwdriver and stealing cash hidden under his pillow.
In August, the Dubai Court of First Instance acquitted the 18-year-old Algerian visitor of assaulting his roommate and stealing Dh1,500 from him in April.
The visitor was stopped at Dubai International Airport a few minutes before he boarded a flight back home.
Airport policemen stopped him shortly after his Egyptian roommate had reported to police that he was beaten and robbed while he was sleeping.
The Egyptian claimed that someone hit his face with the handle of a screwdriver, took the cash kept under the pillow and fled.
Prosecutors appealed the primary judgement before the Appeal Court and sought to have his acquittal overturned.
Presiding judge Saeed Salem Bin Sarm rejected prosecutors and upheld the visitor’s acquittal citing lack of corroborated evidence.
The Egyptian had suspected that his roommate assaulted him and robbed him.
Meanwhile the Algerian strongly refuted the roommate’s claims and pleaded not guilty.
The victim claimed to prosecutors that the suspect had been sharing the room with him and used to sleep on the upper bed.
“We were six bachelors sharing the same room … around 5am, the suspect woke me up and asked me to give him Dh20. As I was too sleepy to notice what had been happening, he hit me with something on my forehead. Once I opened my eyes, I saw him running out of the room. He took Dh1,500 that I had kept under my pillow ... Three weeks before the assault, the suspect and I had a heated argument over him making noise while others were sleeping” the victim told prosecutors.
The appellate ruling remains subject to appeal before the Cassation Court within 20 days.
