Three jailed over camel abuse

Three men who used an electric stun device to make their racing camel run faster are sentenced to three months in prison.

DUBAI // Three men who used an electric stunning device on a racing camel were today sentenced to three months in prison.

SA, a 56-year-old Omani track assistant, MH, a 35-year-old Bangladeshi labourer, and MS, a 36-year-old Emirati, connived to use the device on the camel Sawlajan 12 to make it run faster in a race held in November. The camel came second at the race in question.

The Emirati had denied animal abuse, but said that he realised there was such a device installed to the camel's robot as he watched the animal run.

"I stopped yelling at the camel in the microphone to get her to speed up, had I continued yelling, the camel would have come first," he said.

However, the court did not believe his story and found him guilty. It also did not believe the claims of the labourer, who registered four camels in the race and installed their robots, but claimed he did not even know there was a camel called Sawlajan 12 competing. The track assistant, whose role was to take the camels to the track and return them to the farm afterwards was also found guilty.

The Emirati's father was found not guilty of animal abuse as he had been in Oman at the time. He told the court that he did not believe the other three had knowingly abused the animal.

"It must have happened by mistake, because the prize for the race is not worth it - it's Dh1,000 or Dh2,000, which is not worth the risk," said SM, 54.

The Dubai Misdemeanour Court ordered the confiscation of the camel.