Man denies murdering girlfriend’s ex-partner

ABU DHABI // A man charged with murdering his girlfriend’s ex-partner said he did not agree to kill someone on her behalf, the Criminal Court heard on Monday.

AB, from Tunis, allegedly stabbed AS, from Egypt, to death after his girlfriend RQ, from Canada, incited him to do so.

She is accused of providing him with a murder weapon, the victim’s personal information and dropping him off at the location of the alleged crime.

“I don’t understand the connection — if we speak logic why would I agree to be incited by her and murder someone I don’t even know, what will I benefit from all this?” argued AB.

“I’m not defending her, but our relationship was only for two months, there was no time for incitement and to commit adultery.”

He denied ever hearing about the victim from RQ.

“Even when police arrested me, it was my first time to visit the murder scene, and the watchman did not recognise [me], I request you ask all of the tenant if they have ever seen me there before.”

Investigators forced him to go back to the scene and re-enact the murder, he added.

“I know myself, I was never there how did they find fingerprints there?”

His lawyer Mohammed Al Khazraji argued that the investigations were not objective as there were people involved who were not questioned.

Since the beginning of the trial, AB has claimed psychological illness, and he presented psychiatric reports to show that he was undergoing treatment.

Defence for RQ, Ali Al Abbadi, said police had no right to monitor her phone calls.

“After police found the first defendant’s fingerprints, police went to arrest him while he was in the car with RQ,” the prosecutor said.

He said that the policeman then took her information and discovered text messages between them, and she was summoned for investigation.

“There were no phone calls recorded, because this is only done with the approval of the attorney general.”

Mr Al Abbadi argued that no translator was present during questioning for his client.

“It was clear during questioning that she spoke fluent Arabic since she is originally an Arab, and therefore did not require a translator,” said the prosecutor.

“We also have her certificate, she studied at Al Rawafed school, and she received a 137 out of 175 in Arabic, I don’t think anyone could score such a grade if they were not fluent.”

RQ argued that she took Arabic as a second language and she only spoke “broken Arabic”.

“When you first came to us in court, didn’t we ask you in Arabic and you gave full answers in Arabic?” challenged chief justice Idris Binmansour.

She said she had been learning Arabic in prison and finished the Quran for the first time in her life.

A verdict will be announced on March 18.