DUBAI// An American tourist accused of stealing handcuffs from a police station in Dubai is awaiting a verdict next week.
The 30-year-old defendant, AF, is charged with theft. But his attorney, Yousuf Hammad, said that the prosecution's story did not add up and that AF had found the cuffs, not stolen them.
"This charge is punishable by about five years in prison," Mr Hammad said, adding that he had asked the court to downgrade the charge to possessing a lost item, the penalty for which is a few months in prison or a fine.
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According to records, AF gave police and prosecution two different stories. He confessed to police investigators to stealing the handcuffs off a desk at the Jebel Ali Police Station, but when he was referred to prosecution, he said he had found them.
He told prosecutors that he had come to Dubai for a visit and went to Ibn Battuta Mall. When he left the mall and was walking in the parking lot, he spotted the handcuffs on the ground, he testified.
He said he took them and kept them in his luggage, but as he was leaving the country through Dubai International Airport on February 25, the handcuffs were found. Because they had a serial number that showed they belonged to police, he was accused of theft and taken into custody.
He was detained at the Port Police Station.
The handcuffs belong to OK, a 24-year-old officer at Jebel Ali Police Station.
According to records, before dawn on February 25, AF and three other people were taken to the Jebel Ali station for a security check after a police patrol picked them up for acting suspiciously. At the station, OK was carrying out the check in a room with two desks.
OK said he left his handcuffs on his desk. He found no records for the men during the security check, so he let them go about 6am. He said he went home after work and did not notice the handcuffs missing until the station called him.
Later that day he was informed that a man had been arrested at the airport and charged with stealing his handcuffs.
AF denied the charges before Judge Hamdy Abu al Khair on April 21.
"It's not logical, your honour, that a man being inspected in a security check at a police station would steal from there," Mr Hammad said at the time.
He added that there were three other people with AF, and any of them would have seen him taking the cuffs. He asked why none of those people had been questioned.
AF, who was released on bail on March 1, came to the second hearing on Tuesday with his girlfriend.
salamir@thenational.ae
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”