Man cheats elderly couple with dud cheque for Mercedes

Dubai: An elderly Indian couple preparing to return to their home country after 42 years in the UAE were allegedly duped by an Emirati man who drove away with their Mercedes car after issuing them a dud cheque.

The couple, J.F. and M.F., 75 and 69 respectively, said that on August 9, A. M. F. S., an Emirati, responded to their advertisement in a newspaper for the sale of their Mercedes E280 Elegance (2007 model) and insisted on buying the car the same day as he wished to present it to his daughter who was joining a computer course at the American University in Dubai.

J.F., a businessman living in Karama, said he and his wife agreed to meet him at the Bur Dubai Traffic Department on Shaikh Zayed Road at 7pm. However, when they landed there, the Emirati did not show up. "When we called him, he told us he had met with an accident and that we could meet the next day."

Accordingly, the couple met him at the traffic office at Al Jafliya on August 10. A. M. F. S. insisted on doing all the paperwork on the grounds that they were "elderly". "He asked us to sit down and would not allow us to do anything as he went about getting the car passed, doing the Arabic paperwork for the car transfer and getting an export number plate," said J.F..

"The fact that he was getting an export number plate though he had told us that the car was for his daughter in Dubai, didn't strike us that something might be wrong," said M.F.. Once the formalities were over, A. M. F. S. handed over a cheque for Dh125,000.

He also produced a receipt in the name of a company he claimed to own and asked J.F. to sign on it. However, J.F. said he did not give them a copy of the car transfer papers, saying that he was in a hurry and that he would fax it to them in the evening. But J.F. said he did not get any fax. And when he went to the bank to encash the cheque on August 11, it bounced as the issuer had "insufficient funds". There was also a disparity in the words and figure written on the cheque.

J.F. said the man is absconding ever since. None of the many telephone numbers he had given them were responding, he said.

They filed a complaint with the Bur Dubai Police Station who told them that the Emirati had nine similar cases against him. "We are helpless and the car was the only asset we were left with," said J.F.