Teen grope man found not guilty by Dubai court after mistreatment claims

DUBAI // A man charged with groping a 14-year-old Canadian girl while she slept in her bedroom has been found not guilty.

At Dubai Criminal Court, Bangladeshi Z Z, 25, claimed he was mistreated by police during interviews and said the confession he gave was false.

“I confessed to the investigators so that they would stop beating me,” the defendant said.

Prosecutors said that he had sneaked into the girl’s room on January 30 last year, when police received a panicked phone call from the teenager’s mother at 3am.

The mother said in her testimony: “My daughter told me that she woke up and found a strange man checking out the items in her bedroom.

“She pretended to be sleeping and turned her back to the defendant, but the man then touched her behind and back.”

Emirati policeman E O, 27, said in court: “During investigations the defendant told me that he used his mobile-phone screen light to see the girl’s face. The little girl woke up and the defendant ran away immediately.”

In her statement, the girl said: “There was a fair amount of light in my room coming from the living room. I had my bedroom lights off, the defendant came into my room and lurked for 10 minutes.

“He sat first on my bed and I turned my back to him and pretended I was asleep. Then the man started touching me.”

The court, however, on Sunday acquitted the Bangladeshi of trespassing and sexual assault charges. The reason for the verdict was not given in court records.