Trio arraigned for swindling Dhs17m villa

Hamza M Sengendo, Staff Reporter

A trustee teamed up with miscreants to forge necessary paperwork and sell off an investor’s Dhs17 million villa, prosecutors revealed on Thursday.

The Asian defendant teamed up with an American businessman and his Eurasian colleague to swindle the luxury beachfront villa in Jumeirah owed by a Chinese investor, 30, Al Barsha Police Station records showed.

The defendant counterfeited a Power of Attorney Letter (POA) attributed to the victim, showing it was attested by the Dubai Courts. In it he claimed the victim accepted to transfer the villa’s ownership to the businessman.

He presented a bogus passport of the victim. The Notary Public attested the POA. He forged a No Objection Letter attributed to a realty company that was running the villa. He counterfeited the villa’s ownership certificate.

He forged and used more necessary documents that he presented to the realty company, the Notary Pubic and a transactions clearance company. The businessman and his colleague abetted his activities and escorted him.

On the record, in 2017 the victim was searching for a villa to stay in. He learnt about an auction at the Dubai Courts. He participated and purchased the seven-bedroom villa at Dhs17m. He was handed its ownership certificate.

He did not like its inner decoration. The defendant befriended him and directed him to a décor and maintenance company. The investor was a frequent traveller. The defendant offered to manage the villa in his absence.

The investor gave him a POA allowing him to manage it and follow up with the Dhs900, 000 decoration works. Later, the investor was surprised to learn from a friend that the villa was up for sale on a classifieds website.

He went to the villa and found a man inside who told him he already bought it from the defendant. The investor discovered the defendant committed forgery on the POA and also used a bogus passport for him.

“He forged my signature on it. An on the fake passport he fixed a Chinese man’s photo. To forge the passport he used a copy I earlier handed to him when I rented another villa from him,” explained the investor.

The man who purchased the villa turned out to be the American businessman. “He was complicit because he purchased it at half its price (Dhs7.5m) whereas its market value was more than Dhs15m,” he added.