Girl, 16, was forced to be a prostitute after being lured to Dubai with job offer, court hears

Three men and a woman lured a teenager to the UAE and forced her into prostitution, a court has been told.

Dubai Criminal Court heard that the four Bangladeshis convinced the girl, 16,to apply for a passport and lie about her age so she would be allowed to travel alone. Another woman found the girl in Dhaka, where she was looking for work.

“I told her I would love to work anywhere as long as I would be able to care for my sick parents, but that I didn’t have money for a passport or to buy a ticket,” the girl told prosecutors.

The woman took her number and called her a few days later.

“A woman called me saying she would issue me a visa and wire me enough cash to get a passport and buy a ticket, but said that I would have to give a false age for the passport, which I did,” the girl said.

When she arrived in Dubai on May 3, she was picked up by one of the three accused men and taken to a flat where she stayed for three days.

“I was given some medicine and then taken to a different apartment where I was told I would have to work in prostitution,” she said.

“When I refused, they threatened to send me to jail because of the money I owed them for getting me here.”

She said that for the next eight days she had sex with customers, but on the ninth, police raided the flat in Al Muhaisnah. Police said they had been tipped off about the brothel and had referred the girl to Dubai Foundation for Women and Children.

All four accused were charged with human trafficking. The three men denied the charges, but the woman was not present in court to enter a plea. She was also charged with working as a prostitute.

Two of the men, aged 30 and 35, were also charged with running a brothel and facilitating prostitution. The younger defendant pleaded guilty but the other denied the charges.

The third man, 42, denied an extra charge of having consensual sex outside of wedlock with the woman defendant.

She will be summoned to the next hearing scheduled for September 3.