Dubai: Dubai Cassation Court has ordered a local bank to pay Dh5.5 million to a customer whose account balance was seized by a bank employee in connivance with another defendant.
The court was told that the second defendant impersonated the customer and withdraw the money.
According to records, the Saudi customer had opened an account in 2015 and deposited Dh4.9 million for property investment. He left the amount in his account, but was shocked when he returned after two years to withdraw the money and found that the available balance was zero. The victim then filed a case and the subsequent investigation found the customer service employee guilty of stealing the money from the account. The Arab employee of the bank had copied the identity details of the customer and went to the bank’s branch manager, claiming that the defendant wanted to close his account and withdraw the money as he was no longer staying in the UAE. The employee brought an African man along with him, who looked like the bank customer, to the bank, wearing the victim’s national dress and a sunglass to con the teller and withdraw the money.
An official at the bank testified that there was a dispute between the bank employee and the teller because the latter wanted to check the original ID of the customer.
“The employee provided the teller with a copy of the ID and told the teller that he didn’t need to see the original ID because he had already seen the original. The employee then signed on the copy of the ID to withdraw the money,” the official said on record.
The employee and the African defendants were arrested and sentenced to three years in jail, to be followed by deportation, by Dubai Court of First Instance over charges of fraud. Moreover, the victim’s lawyer, Mohammad Al Awami Al Mansouri, said that his client had lodged a civil case to claim his rights from the bank and the two defendants.
“The bank employee was convicted as he took advantage of his job to steal the money. He used his power to obtain the customer’s details and a copy of his ID to steal the money. The bank should pay the money to the customer as the bank was responsible for the money,” Lawyer Al Mansouri told Gulf News.
Dubai Cassation Court has ordered the bank and the two defendants to pay Dh5.5 million to the customer.
