DUBAI // A worker at a clothes shop who was sentenced to two years in jail for luring a seven-year-old girl with a toy then molesting her, lost his appeal bid on Sunday morning.
Surveillance footage showed the Bangladeshi worker, M A, 33 lifting the girl onto his lap.
Dubai Criminal Court had heard that the Lebanese girl’s father was shopping with his wife and two daughters in Al Muraqqabat on May 9 when the incident is said to have occurred.
“I could see my daughters most of the time near us but then one of them came to me and said that a worker at the shop had showed her a toy and lured her into an empty corner then molested her,” said N K, the father.
He added that the worker had first tried to lure his younger, six-year-old daughter but the man failed when the older sister pulled the girl away to look at an item in the shop.
M A was charged with hugging the seven-year-old and touching her private parts while not allowing her to break free.
The father said the he could not catch the defendant at the time of the incident because he fled but he went to the shop’s management and asked to see the surveillance camera footage.
“When they refused I called police, who came and turned on the camera recording,” N K said. “I saw him taking my daughter into his lap but then I couldn’t keep watching because I was stunned.”
The father said the Bangladeshi man was arrested in June after an employee at the shop called police when he returned.
Prosecutors said M A confessed to a charge of molestation when interrogated. However, he denied it in court and was convicted. He was sentenced to two years in jail, which he appealed against and lost.
salamir@thenational.ae
