Dubai
A waiter has been jailed for three years for luring a businessman to meet a blonde woman at a hotel room where he locked him and stole his Dh14,000.
The Emirati businessman was supposed to meet up with the blonde woman at the hotel room in Mankhool area in September.
Once the Emirati knocked the room’s door around 3am, an African woman opened the door for him and when he asked her about the blonde woman, she told him that she was in the bathroom.
As soon as he walked into the room, two Nigerian men, a 28-year-old waiter and a 26-year-old cleaner, were reported to have came out of the washroom and restrained him.
Records said the Nigerian men took the businessman’s wallet and two mobile phones, kept him locked in the room while the woman [who opened the door] and a third man left the room.
The Nigerian men threatened to break the businessman’s leg if he didn’t provide them with the passcode of his credit and debit cards.
The Nigerians went back to the room, gave back the wallet and mobiles to the Emirati and absconded.
The Emirati went down to the lobby and called the police.
Preliminary investigation led to the arrest of the cleaner and the waiter.
On Sunday, the Dubai Court of First Instance convicted the 28-year-old defendant of confining the businessman in the hotel room, threatening to break his legs and stealing his Dh14,000 in cash and credit card withdrawals.
Citing lack of corroborated evidence, presiding judge Fahd Al Shamsi acquitted the 26-year-old suspect of any wrongdoing.
Presiding judge Al Shamsi said the accused will be deported. The suspects had pleaded not guilty.
The Emirati businessman said his friend had introduced him to a Romanian woman.
“The woman had sent me her blonde photo and she claimed that she is Romanian. I was supposed to meet her up in a hotel room to give her money to be able to pay her bills. We had become friends and I went to meet her for that purpose. I was surprised when I saw an African woman opening the door. Then the suspects came out and threatened to break my legs if I didn’t give them the passcodes of my bank cards. Although they spoke to me gently and in a friendly tone, I suspected them. I was coerced to give them my passcodes since I had been threatened … then they returned to the room and gave me back my wallet and phones. I called the police once I went down to the lobby,” he testified to prosecutors.
A police sergeant who questioned the Emirati told prosecutors: “He claimed to me that the African woman told him that she was the alleged Romanian woman’s maid … then he claimed that the suspects came out from the washroom and stole his wallet. The suspects were apprehended from the same hotel.”
The ruling remain subject to appeal.
