DUBAI // A policeman who shot dead a fellow officer he suspected had raped him has lost his appeal against a life sentence.
On November 8, 2015, the Yemeni sergeant, 26, started his shift at Al Raffa police station and collected his gun, bullets and handcuffs from the victim.
He shot the armoury officer, 53, three times in the head, killing him instantly, before surrendering to the station’s commanding officer.
Another officer said he saw the killer stand behind the victim and say: “When you and that other man came to my residence, what did you do to me?”
“I didn’t think it was serious. I thought they were joking,” said the witness, 51.
The station commander said the defendant came to him after the shooting.
“He told me he was surrendering himself for killing his colleague so that legal action could be taken against him. He handed me his weapon,” he said.
When the commander asked why he had shot his colleague, he answered that the victim and another man had sexually assaulted him 15 days earlier.
“He told me that the armoury officer had gagged him with a cloth with chemicals on it, which made him lose consciousness,” the commander said. “When he woke up, he figured out he had been raped.”
A medical examination found that the officer was sane, but suffered from paranoia after being raped in 2008.
He was jailed by the Dubai Criminal Court. The Court of Appeal ruled he must serve his prison term. He will be deported after completing his sentence.
salamir@thenational.ae