Photo has been used for illustrative purpose.

Mohammed Yassen, Staff Reporter

The Dubai Criminal Court sentenced an Asian, 47, to 10 years in jail to be followed by deportation and fined him Dhs50,000 on charges of possessing and promoting drugs via a website and a WhatsApp messaging group.

The case dated back to last February when a tip-off was received that an Asian possessed a quantity of narcotics and psychotropic substances.

According to a policeman’s statement in the investigations, a team of detectives located the suspect and arrested him. He guided the detectives to his room where a transparent plastic bag containing plastic rolls with 7.5 kilograms of methamphetamine inside was found. A sensitive scale and other tools for packing narcotics were also found.

The defendant admitted that a person in his home country assigned him about a month before he was arrested to receive the narcotics, divide them into bags and then distribute them in random areas in Dubai.

He was also requested to take pictures of those sites and send the data to a person in the UAE in return for Dhs2,000 per month.

The police referred the defendant to the Public Prosecution and the court issued a verdict against him.

Separately, the Dubai Court of Appeal upheld a verdict issued by the Court of First Instance sentencing a gang of five Africans to two years in jail to be followed by deportation and fining them Dhs300,000 on charges of stealing an amount equal to the fine from an Asian trader once he left a bank.

The case dated back to February 2020 when the victim filed a complaint in which he stated that he had been assaulted and robbed by coercion by a group of Africans.

The victim stated in the investigations that five people took him by surprise on his way to his vehicle after he encashed a Dhs300,000 cheque from a bank branch in Al Quoz Industrial Area.

The victim added that he tried to resist them but one of them threatened him with a knife, wounded him and tore his shirt before they took his money and fled away with a vehicle.