DUBAI // A jobless man who entered a model’s apartment, threw a plastic bag over her head and attempted to rape her has won a reduced sentence at Dubai Court of Appeal.
The defendant, 27, who holds a Comoros Islands passport, was sentenced by Dubai Criminal Court to three years in jail and deportation. He appealed and won a reduced term of one year but will still be deported after completing his sentence.
On the night of February 6 last year, the 35-year-old Moroccan victim was washing clothes in her bathroom.
Her door was unlocked as her sister had gone to buy groceries.
“I heard the door open and thought my sister had returned but was shocked when I saw a man standing outside my bathroom door,” said the model.
The drunk defendant placed a plastic bag on the woman’s head but when she removed it, he pulled her by the hair, began hitting her and demanded sex.
She said he threw her to the floor as she was screaming for help. “He tried to undress me with one hand while strangling me with the other, but my sister arrived and grabbed him from the back of his shirt,” said the woman.
The sister, 37, said she tried to restrain him until police arrived. He escape through window but was arrested shortly afterwards.
An Emirati policeman who questioned the defendant said: “He told me that he was drunk and leaving a nightclub when he saw the woman and followed her home, then decided to rob her home.”
The officer said the suspect confessed to entering the apartment, believing it was empty, but found the woman there and they fought as she was trying to stop him from fleeing.
In both courts, the man denied charges of trespassing, attempted rape and consuming alcohol without a licence.
However, he was convicted of all charges.
salamir@thenational.ae