Man convicted of verbal assault only wanted to help ex-wife choose the right path, court hears

The defendant's lawyer said his client had denied the charges from the offset.

ABU DHABI // A man convicted of verbal assault only wanted to lead his former wife “down the right path” after finding her with another man, Abu Dhabi Appeals Court heard on Thursday morning.

Emirati A S, convicted of insulting the woman after sending her offensive texts, only “meant to advise her and lead her back to the rightful path”, his lawyer, Ali Al Abbadi, told the court.

Although the Court of Cassation sent the case back to appeals, because of a procedural error involved in the questioning of the defendant, the presiding judge said the evidence was overriding.

“The text of the message is there from Etisalat,” said Chief Justice Dr Khairi Al Kabbash.

“There is no denial here, because we have the text of the message in front of us.”

The defence lawyer said his client had denied the charges from the offset.

“The pillar of the offence is not there, and she is not innocent from what he said,” Mr Al Abbadi told the court.

Records presented during the hearing showed that the woman, before filing the case against her former husband, had been caught by police as she spent “illegitimate” time alone with a foreigner who answered the door of his Dubai flat in his underwear.

“Maybe she was showing him the monuments in Dubai,” joked the judge.

“So, he [A S] said to her behave well so you’ll be in heaven, and so on?” he added.

The defence lawyer also argued that the lawsuit resulted from a grudge the defendant’s former wife held against him after he filed for custody of their children. The woman’s case was filed on September 11 last year, two days after A S filed his, the court heard.

The defendant’s initial sentence of one month in prison, handed down by the Court of First Instance, was reduced to a Dh2,000 fine by the appeals court. The verdict was then sent back to the cassation court before being bounced back to appeals.

The case was adjourned.