Man sexually harasses tourist in elevator

dubai — A worker was charged at the Dubai Court of First Instance after he allegedly sexually harassed a tourist in the lift of a residential tower.

Prosecutors accused the 24-year-old Indian man of taking advantage that he was alone with the tourist, a British, in the lift to expose himself to her and inappropriately touch her.

The public prosecution wants him to be severely punished, according to the law, while he remains in detention. The worker denied the charge in court.

The complainant, 35, said she came to the UAE to visit her husband. “Around 4.40pm on the day of the incident, I was going to practise yoga at the gym on the 37th floor. An Asian man took the lift with me. It was just the two of us. He stood so close to me in a way to touch me. I was moving away but he would not step away from my left side. I could hear him moaning.”

She recounted that she did not scream for help, talk to the man or push him away, as she felt worried of what he could possibly do to her.

“He walked out at 34th flooe and when I reached the 37th floor, I found his semen traces on my clothes,” she told the public prosecution investigator.

She reported him to the hotel security and the surveillance cameras were checked. She identified him in the video recordings. The incident was reported at Bur Dubai police station and a forensics team was sent. The lift did not have any camera but the defendant was captured on camera right before he entered the lift after her.

A police corporal said they arrested the suspect around 5.30pm the next day at the same tower. “He admitted during interrogation that he stood very close to the woman in a way to touch her on purpose more than once.”

The woman’s sports clothes, she was then wearing, were seized. The defendant’s DNA traces were found on the tourist’s clothes, as shown in a report. A ruling will be pronounced on February 25.