Dubai: The Dubai Court of First Instance sentenced an Emirati man to seven years in jail for stabbing his countryman and killing him.
The 37-year-old defendant cut into an artery of the victim when he stabbed him with a knife in his forearm in the course of an intense argument in Al Qusais in August this year.
The victim had gone with his friend to the defendant’s house when they saw the defendant and his friend sitting in a black car.
The car belonged to another friend of the victim but the defendant’s friend had borrowed it four days earlier and not returned it. So the victim informed his friend of the whereabouts of his car. This prompted an angry reaction from the defendant, an alleged drug addict, who stabbed the victim for informing his friend about where the vehicle was.
An Emirati witness who was with the victim said, “The defendant started yelling at the victim because he had alerted the owner about the whereabouts of his car. The defendant then picked up a knife, sat beside the victim inside the car and then stabbed him before fleeing the scene with his friend.”
The witness said he believed the defendant and his friend were under the influence of drugs when the incident happened.
The defendant and his friend fled to Fujairah before they were arrested in Ras Al Khaimah within 24 hours of the incident.
The victim was transferred to hospital but died of his injuries later the same day.
During questioning, the accused said it was the victim who attacked him with the knife and that he took the knife and stabbed the victim in self defence. He later washed the knife at a petrol station and then hid it inside the car.
Dubai Public Prosecution charged the defendant with assault which led to death.
