Top court reviewing death ruling

Sharjah: The Supreme Court is reviewing the death sentence against an American who murdered a German engineer last year, a legal source told Gulf News.

Last year the Appeals Court in Sharjah rejected the plea of Shahid Poliss King and upheld the death sentence against him for killing Martin Herbert Steiner by suffocating him, stuffing his body in a suitcase and dumping it in the desert.

A court source told Gulf News Poliss, in his mid-30s, was sentenced to death while his Ethiopian partner, Fawzia Nigash Yousuf, was convicted of aiding and abetting the crime, theft and having an illicit affair and she was sentenced to three years in jail followed by deportation.

Poliss, an American Muslim, entered the country on a visit visa using a forged British passport, according to sources. Steiner, a 48-year-old German businessman, had been reported missing and his body was found 15 days later by police off the Dubai-Hatta Road.