Court acquits 4 of stealing Dhs200 million in Dubai

Mohammed Yaseen. Staff Reporter

The Dubai Appellate Court upheld the verdict of the Court of First Instance acquitting 4 Asians of the charge of stealing Dhs200 million from an investor, who claimed that he had given them money to build a luxury hotel in Dubai and to establish a company to run the hotel.

The details of the case date back to 2018, when an Asian investor submitted a report complaining that four compatriots had seized his money.

According to the complainant, he agreed with one of the suspects, who was his friend, to establish a company and construct a 5-star hotel in Dubai, since the latter was an Arab and can travel between countries easily, but after several years, he found what he had agreed upon with the first suspect had not been implemented.

In the interrogations, the investor added that he submitted all the documents proving his ownership of the company and the hotel to be established in Dubai, and also submitted an account statement proving that he had transferred amounts of money to the same company run by his friend (the first suspect) and three others, including the wife of one of them.

The lawyer of one of the suspects stated that his client did not receive money from the investor and that he was the real owner of the company that the investor claimed to own, adding that his client was earlier kidnapped by the investor who forced him to sign a waiver of the hotel and the company.

The lawyer asked the court to refer the investor’s complaint to an expert to verify the authenticity of the transfers he claimed he had made to the suspects.

The court appointed a tripartite committee from the Department of Expertise and Dispute Settlement, whose report affirmed that the contract to establish the company and the hotel and their commercial license were owned by the first suspect from the beginning, but the complainant stated that they were actually owned by him.

The report also affirmed that the transferred funds were in return for commercial transactions and the supply of materials and paintings between the complainant and the suspect.