Dubai: A visitor has been jailed for 10 years for mixing heroin with detergent powder in an attempt to send it to a friend back home in Seychelles.
An informant alerted drug enforcement officers that the 39-year-old visitor from Seychelles possessed heroin for promotional purposes in his hotel room in Dubai.
A drug police team raided the room and apprehended the visitor.
The Dubai Court of First Instance convicted the 39-year-old defendant of possessing 990 gram of heroin for export purposes.
According to the primary ruling, the court also fined the defendant Dh50,000.
The 39-year-old pleaded not guilty and denied his accusation when he defended himself in court.
“I did not possess anything,” he argued before the presiding judge.
The accused will be deported after serving his punishment.
The defendant claimed during questioning that he had arranged with a cargo company to send the consignment of heroin to his friend back home.
Police accompanied the visitor to the cargo company and retrieved the consignment of heroin packed inside a box.
An anti-narcotics police corporal testified: “Following the informant’s tip off, we raided the defendant’s hotel room and arrested him. When we asked him if he had any drugs on him, he admitted that he paid for a cargo company to dispatch heroin to his friend in Seychelles. Then we headed to the cargo company and checked consignment box, inside which we found the heroin mixed up with laundry powder inside a detergent box. During questioning, the accused claimed that the man in Seychelles paid him money and paid for his trip and assignment to dispatch the heroin.”
The primary ruling remains subject to appeal.
