Man jailed, fined for smuggling drugs

Sohaila Ahmed, Staff Reporter

An Asian man was sentenced to 10 years in jail, followed by deportation and a fine of Dhs50,000 for smuggling 560g of drugs inside his stomach into the country.

The defendant was suspected by a customs officer while entering the UAE, and was asked to undergo a body scanning.

The scanner revealed a stranger object inside his stomach, and when he was asked about it, he confessed to having 86 capsules of Methamphetamine, weighing 560g.

The man confessed to smuggling the drugs in order to sell them to another person for $1000.

Separately, the Dubai Public Prosecution sentenced three Asians to 3 months of imprisonment, followed by deportation for forging an official document in Dubai.

The details date back to last August, when a security guard of a construction company called police to report about the defendants, who showed a forged ID to enter the site.

The guard testified that the defendants handed him an ID with an Arabic name different from the English one on it. The defendants confessed to the guard that he used a fake ID as he was an Illegal visitor. Police arrested the defendants and charged them with forgery. They all are facing deportation after spending 3 months in jail.

Recently, a 27-year-old man was arrested and referred to the criminal court, along with other runaway accomplices, for impersonating the identity of undercover police officers and robbing a group of men of over Dhs642,000 in cash and other items.

Official records indicate that the victim worked in a company which entrusted him with huge amounts of money to be deposited in another company’s account, and a day before the incident, the victim received an amount of Dhs551,200 to be deposited.

When the victim was late in depositing the amount, he had to return to his sharing apartment with it and hid it in a safe under his bed.

At that night, while the victim was having dinner with his roommates, the defendant and his accomplices barged into the apartment and showed a fake badge, claiming they were undercover police officers who came to arrest the victim and his roommates on drug charges.

When the victim denied possessing any drugs, the defendant and his gang searched the place. When nothing was found, the defendant then asked if there was money in the apartment.

The scared victim led him to the hidden safe, explaining that it belonged to the company he works in and showed the receipt for it. The victim also showed an amount of Dhs91,100 that belonged to him.