DUBAI // A man’s 10-year sentence for smuggling more than six kilograms of cocaine was upheld by Dubai Criminal Court on Thursday.
Filipino R R, 38, confessed in both criminal and appeal courts that he possessed the drug but said he was only passing through Dubai.
He was convicted of smuggling 6.4kg of cocaine.
“I was a transit passenger heading to Vietnam, not delivering the drugs to Dubai,” he said in court in March.
Prosecutors said that on October 30 last year the defendant was arrested after arriving from Brazil.
“I was on duty in Terminal 3 at Dubai International Airport and when R R arrived I suspected he was carrying something banned, so I checked his bag and found a number of women’s purses inside, which, when I checked, had a strange thickness to their bottom,” said Emirati policeman A A, 38.
The officer added that he cut open the purses and found the drugs. “He immediately confessed and said that he was carrying the drugs to Vietnam in return for US$3,000 (Dh11,020).”
He was fined Dh50,000 and will be deported after serving the jail term.
salamir@thenational.ae