Jail for Dubai policeman who forged sick notes for Thailand trip

Emirati RA, 30, was charged with forgery and use of forged documents. He did not appear in court to enter a plea and was jailed in absentia.

DUBAI // A policeman who paid Dh200 for fake sick notes so he could have time off work to travel abroad has been sentenced to three months in jail.

Emirati RA, 30, was charged with forgery and use of several forged documents. He did not appear in court to enter a plea and was jailed in absentia.

Prosecutors said RA had been the subject of an internal investigation after missing a number of days from work. He provided doctor’s notes to cover his absence.

REA, 28, an Emirati police investigator, said when he compared the dates of absence with the stamps in RA’s passport, he found that RA had been in Thailand at the same time.

REA said that last year from April 30 to May 9 and from June 5 to 10, RA was out of the country despite the fact that he had called in sick.

“After this was found out, we had all his sick leave checked and we discovered that most of the notes were fake. We tried to contact him but his mobile was switched off, which forced us to send a patrol to his station to bring him in,” said REA.

The officer said RA confessed to buying doctor’s notes that were officially stamped but with the name and dates left blank.

Prosecutors told the Dubai Criminal Court that the same handwriting had been used to fill in all of the fake notes. They were also written in Arabic, whereas most doctors use English.

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