DUBAI // A 50-year-old Briton has been sentenced to two years in jail for causing his compatriot’s death after shoving his chest and causing the man internal bleeding.
Prosecutors charged him with assaulting the safety of a man as the push led to internal bleeding that blocked the victim’s lung passages.
“I’m not guilty, sir,” said the defendant when he appeared at Dubai Criminal Court in May.
The incident happened on October 16 last year in Tecom, now Barsha Heights, after the birthday party of a mutual friend.
A 34-year-old Pakistani financial supervisor who witnessed the incident called police and an ambulance.
“The two were obviously drunk. They stood 10 metres away from me and my friend near Media Rotana hotel, where we were waiting for a taxi,” said the witness.
He told prosecutors that the two men walked to the sandy patch opposite the hotel then the defendant shoved the other man on his chest.
“The second man fell on the ground, hitting his head on a small rock, while the assailant left in a taxi with two or three women and a man,” said the Pakistani, who walked towards the victim and found him gasping for air.
The Pakistani’s friend wrote down the number of the taxi the defendant took and handed it to police. The victim was taken to the nearby Saudi-German Hospital in a critical condition, where he died the next day.
“When we summoned the defendant he said that he only pushed the man because he had molested one of his friends,” said a 39-year-old police lieutenant.
A medical report stated that the deceased, whose age was not mentioned, suffered from cardiomegaly, an enlarged heart. He also suffered from bleeding in the stomach inflicted by a health condition prior to the incident. The report added that the bleeding leaked into the lungs’ air passages.
The Briton will be deported after serving his prison term.
salamir@thenational.ae