Women who shot naked video of manicurist in blackmail plot are jailed

DUBAI // Three women who kidnapped a manicurist and filmed her naked before sending the video to her brother, demanding a ransom, were each jailed for three years.

The Moroccan women and an Egyptian businessman kidnapped the manicurist on September 19 last year, while she was waiting for a taxi in Al Nahda.

They pushed the 29-year-old into the businessman’s car before taking her to a nearby flat where they threatened to kill her if she screamed.

Two other Moroccan women, aged 24 and 26, and a 30-year-old Ethiopian woman were found guilty of aiding and abetting by locking up the victim in the one-bedroom apartment. Each was sentenced to two years in prison.

The manicurist’s passport was torn and she was slapped repeatedly then forced to strip naked and use unethical language while her kidnappers filmed her and then sent the video to her brother in Morocco, the court heard.

“When I asked her what she wanted from me, she said money,” the victim said.

“I told her I did not have money but she told me that my brother was rich because he owns a business in Italy.”

After sending the video via WhatsApp, the kidnappers forced the manicurist to call her sibling and tell him to pay Dh2.58 million to the kidnapper’s husband in Morocco or they would post the recording online.

“After the phone call, the 26-year-old woman called for three men to come into the room then [she] told them to rape me but, when they saw that I had my menstrual cycle, they refrained from doing so,” the victim said.

The brother agreed to send the money within two days but, in that time, his sister was beaten by all five women and stabbed in the hand.

The brother called a friend of his in Dubai, who reported the incident to police after seeing the video. Police found the apartment and raided it at 11pm the same day.

“The female defendants were smoking shisha in the living room while the victim was alone in the bedroom,” said a 31-year-old Emirati policeman.

The officer said all the women were arrested at the apartment and the victim referred to Latifa Hospital. The male defendants were apprehended later.

The video was found on one of the kidnapper’s phones, as well as other pictures of the manicurist tied up and blindfolded.

Two men, aged 30 and 33, were found guilty of aiding and abetting and each was sentenced to a year in prison.

The 26-year-old Moroccan kidnapper was also found guilty of a sexual assault charge, issuing threats, blackmail and deliberately damaging an official document.

They will all be deported after completing their sentences.