DUBAI // A husband and wife have been jailed for 10 years for bringing a 15-year-old orphan to Dubai on the promise of a job as a maid and then forcing her into prostitution.
M M and M A, both 46 and from Bangladesh, arranged for the girl, also from Bangladesh, to receive a passport altered to show she was old enough for a work visa.
“M A visited my grandparents and told them that she had a well-paid job for me in Dubai as a maid, and they agreed,” said the girl, who lived with her grandparents after her parents died. She arrived at Dubai airport last year and was picked up by the couple and their driver M A A, 42, also from Bangladesh.
The girl was taken to a flat in Al Rafaa, where her passport was seized and she was beaten and threatened by M M and his wife. She said the couple at first forced her to massage men but soon after she was forced to have sex with customers.
A 19-year-old Bangladeshi told prosecutors she was also offered a job as a masseuse in Dubai. She arrived in the UAE on September 9 last year at Sharjah Airport and was taken to the same flat in Al Rafaa
She said that on her first day working as a prostitute she cried in front of a customer and he agreed to help and sent a text to Dubai police.
M M, M A and M A A all denied human trafficking but were each sentenced to 10 years in jail to be followed by deportation.
salamir@thenational.ae