Dubai airport porter caught stealing on surveillance camera

An airport porter is accused of stealing after being caught on camera rifling through passengers' luggage.

DUBAI // A porter at Dubai International Airport was caught on camera stealing from passengers' luggage, a court heard today.

Supervisor, RZ, 30, from India, told prosecutors that he watched a surveillance recording showing a porter rifling through luggage as it was being loaded onto a plane on September 3 last year and that he believed the recording showed AS, 24, from Kenya.

"The person's face in the recording was not clear but he was wearing a band around his wrist, and the only one in my team who wears such a band is [AS]," said the supervisor.

The Emirati police officer OK, 28, testified that under interrogation the porter initially denied stealing anything, but then changed his story and confessed, saying that he would often take items that fell out of passengers' luggage as he loaded the aeroplanes.

At the Criminal Court the porter was charged with the theft of an ear piece and a pack of cigarettes, which he denied.

"No I didn't steal them your honour, I found them and took them," the porter told Judge Maher Salameh.

A verdict is expected on January 30.