Three jailed for forcing girl into prostitution in Dubai
Trio get five years, followed by deportation
Dubai: Dubai Court of First Instance has sentenced a gang of three men to jail for trafficking a minor girl and forcing her into prostitution.
The defendants, aged between 24 to 31, allegedly brought the 16-year-old teen from Bangladesh to work as a prostitute at a brothel in Al Refa’a area.
In September 2019, Dubai Police was alerted about the teenager working in the sex industry, following which they raided the apartment to rescue the girl.
The girl said that a woman in her home country told her that she can find a decent job in Dubai and issued a passport and visit visa to travel to the UAE.
The first defendant welcomed her at Sharjah International Airport before taking her to a Dubai apartment and forced her to work as a prostitute.
“He told me that I need to pay them money to return me to my country. They forced me to work as a prostitute. They kept taking me from one apartment to another,” the teen said in official records.
After a few months, the 24-year-old defendant gave her a mobile phone to call him for emergencies but she called Dubai Police and guided them to the apartment to rescue her.
“On the next day, the police asked me to call the defendant and lure him to come to the apartment. I called him and claimed I’m sick and as he entered the apartment, policemen raided the place and arrested the defendant with two other men who were running the brothel.”
A 28-year-old Emirati policeman testified that the main defendant raped the girl a few times and forced her into prostitution before selling her to a brothel for Dh8,000.
“We arrested other prostitutes in the brothel and referred them to prosecution. They admitted that the first defendant brought the girl to the apartment to work with them and that the other two were running the place,” said the policeman in records.
Dubai Public Prosecution charged the defendants with human trafficking. The 24-year-old defendant was additionally charged with raping the victim, while the other two were charged with running a brothel.
They were sentenced to five years in jail, to be followed by deportation on Tuesday.
The verdict will be subject to appeal within 15 days.