Clerk punished for bid to swindle Dhs12m

Hamza M Sengendo, Staff Reporter

A clerk who tried to swindle a police officer’s Dhs12m after claiming he would use it to purchase a chemical to clean tainted Dhs45m was punished on Wednesday. 

The Arab man, 40, claimed he had foreign currencies worth Dhs45m tainted with a substance that required a cleaning chemical. To cement his claim, he forged dollar and Euro bills as samples to prove he had them.

Besides forgery, prosecutors accused him of trying to swindle Dhs12 million belonging to Dubai Police after meeting the officer and telling him he had the huge quantity of dollar and Euro bills for sale at Dhs12 million.

He claimed the dollars and Euros worth Dhs45 million simply required a cleaning chemical and it was up to the buyer to shoulder expenses of purchasing the chemical. The officer lured him into an ambush on April 22.

Policemen pinned him down. He denied all charges. The Criminal Court sentenced him to six months in prison plus deportation and slapped him with a Dhs200, 000 fine. It ordered the counterfeits be confiscated.

On the record, a source alerted police the defendant was peddling fake banknotes and conducting money-doubling activities. An Emirati warrant officer posed as a customer seeking to buy banknotes from him.

They set an appointment to meet near a restaurant in Abu Hail at 9pm. “I, and the source called him to our car. He fetched the samples from his car and sat in ours. He handed us three $100 bills and one €500 bill.

“He also handed us a blackish $100 bill and a greenish €500 bill that appeared to be counterfeits. He told me both required a chemical solution to make them authentic. I told him I wanted to buy many,” said the officer.

“He told me he had bills worth Dhs45 million for sale at Dhs12 million. I accepted to buy and clean them. I asked him where they were. He promised to bring them in 15 minutes. I made a signal to the team.”

They nabbed him. He argued he was innocent. After realising the team was determined to arrest him, he entreated them to let go of him and kept promising to bring the kingpin who provided him with the bills.

He refused to let the police team search his car. Following a prosecution order, they searched the car’s trunk and landed on a bag full of blackish and greenish bills. They were covered with a powdery substance.

During court questioning, the jury showed him the fake samples and he claimed, “I don’t know what’s happening. I have never even seen these anywhere before.”