Dubai: A salesman arrested with 1,040 banned pills at Dubai airport claimed to have brought them as medicine for a friend’s father.
In May, a customs inspector stopped the 29-year-old Indian man at the arrivals terminal and asked to search his luggage.
On having the luggage scanned, according to records, the inspector found 700 pills of Pregabalin and 340 pills of Tramadol in it.
Prosecutors accused the suspect of smuggling and possessing banned substances.
The suspect pleaded not guilty and told the Dubai Court of First Instance that he was not aware that he was carrying a banned medicine.
“Yes, I brought those substances, but I did that as a favour to a friend who sent those pills to his sick father in the UAE. I was not aware that the pills are banned,” he told presiding judge Urfan Omar.
Defending his client, the suspect’s lawyer Saeed Al Gailani said: “My client did not have any criminal intention. He was not aware of the kind of medicine that his friend had handed him at the airport for his sick father. He brought that medicine as a favour. The pills were put inside a closed and wrapped box and he did not know that they were banned … all he knew was that he was doing a good deed.”
The lawyer submitted to the court a copy of a landmark ruling issued by the Dubai Cassation Court according to which a person who carries a ‘wrapped and closed’ parcel without knowing its contents will not be held accountable for what is inside.
“My client has told police and prosecutors that he was aware that he was carrying medicines, but he did not know that they were banned. He did not have criminal intent and we ask the court to acquit him,” Al Gailani said.
A ruling will be heard on July 27.
