Mother stranded in Dubai over glass of wine

A MOTHER is stranded in Dubai after she and her four-year-old daughter were kept in jail for three days when she was arrested for drinking a glass of wine on a flight.

Dr Ellie Holman, 44, was held at the Gulf state’s international airport after officials asked if she had consumed alcohol during her eight-hour flight from Gatwick.

The mother of three, a dentist, from Sevenoaks, Kent, says she and her daughter were kept in a “baking hot and foul smelling” airport detention centre and not allowed to call her husband Gary. “My passport remains confiscated until the case is settled, which I have been told will take at least a year,” she said.

“So far this situation has cost me around £30,000 in legal fees, expenses and missed work. My practice is closed. All our savings have gone.”

Their nightmare began when an immigration official told Dr Holman her visa was no longer valid. She said she had visited several times before and, as the visa had not expired, she assumed it was still usable, but the immigration officer told her it was valid for a single visit and that she had to buy a ticket and return to London immediately.

Dr Holman then became embroiled in a stand-off with officials at the airport and claims she was asked if she had been drinking alcohol.

“I told him I had a glass of wine on the flight. It was given to me free by Emirates Airlines staff,” she said. When Dr Holman began to record the official on her mobile phone, she and her daughter, Bibi, were “surrounded” by armed police who told her that recording airport staff was a criminal offence and took them into custody.

Dr Holman claims she and her daughter were denied water and toilet facilities.

The pair were ordered to sleep in a canteen area used by other inmates, which she claims was “baking hot and foul-smelling”.

Dr Holman said she was barred from contacting her husband back home, and says her little girl was “terrified” by aggressive prison staff.

“I have never heard her cry in the same way as she did in that cell,” she said.

Mr Holman flew to Dubai to try to sort the issue out, leaving their other children, Suri, nine, and Noah, eight, with relatives.

Bibi and her father have been allowed to fly back to the UK but Dr Holman faces a wait of up to a year for her case to be settled.