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29 March 2024

Five get jail for in three human trafficking cases

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By Staff

In three separate cases, the Court of Appeal on Sunday upheld jail terms against five suspects on charges of human trafficking, while one suspect got relieved.

The Court of Appeal upheld 10 year jail terms for two Bangladeshi’s who allegedly forced a 15 year old into prostitution, Khaleej Times reported.

The accused, a 36-year-old hotel worker and a 25-year-old jobless woman, allegedly lured the victim promising a maid’s job.

They locked up the minor in an apartment in Naif and forced her to have sex for money under threat and intimidation.

Narrating her ordeal in the court, which was held privately after the victim broke into tears, she managed to escape once by sheer chance.

Taking a cab, she immediately rushed to the Naif Police station, which received her complaint and set a trap to arrest the accused.

The man was also found guilty of raping the minor and the woman of indulging in prostitution. Both face deportation after serving the sentence.

In a second case of the day, a 52 year old Filipina housewife, was cleared of trafficking charges while her co-accused’s sentence of five year jail was upheld by the Court of Appeal.

The housewife and the 31-year-old visitor were found guilty by the Court of First Instance in May of forcing two women compatriots into prostitution after they had lured them from their home country.

According to court records, the two defendants allegedly lured two compatriots to come to the city offering them waitress jobs. They then seized their official documents and forced them to have sex with men for their own gain.

However, Defence lawyer Mohammed Al Suwaidi, representing the housewife told the court that his client had leased the apartment, that was allegedly being run as a brothel, and held back the passports of the alleged victims to make them pay her the rents and not to coerce them into prostitution or to sexually exploit them.

The two alleged victims, 27 and 28, were forced into prostitution in an apartment in Baraha under threats and intimidation. “We were suffering and had to have lots of customers a day,” they said during the investigation. They had sex for money for 11 days.

One day one of them managed to escape from the apartment of a drunken Egyptian pleasure seeker.

The police raided the defendants’ place on April 8, last year and nabbed one of the accused in Sharjah.

In another case, the Court of Appeal upheld the five -year imprisonment given to a Russian woman and an Indian man convicted of human trafficking.

All the verdicts are subject to appeal within 30 days at the Cassation Court.