Emirati court sentences 5 foreigners to death for murder

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – An Emirati court has sentenced to death five people who were convicted of first degree murder and theft of a businessman whose body was found in a refrigerator, media reported officials.

The criminal court in Ajman, a dusty little emirate in the United Arab Emirates, on Tuesday handed down the rare conviction of five foreigners in the country who allegedly stabbed the expatriate businessman to death and stole more than $ 29,600 from his home of the city-state, the Dubai government-owned Al-Bayan newspaper reported.

The report did not name the defendants or specify their nationality, but identified them as five Asian expatriates, aged between 21 and 39. The businessman has also been identified as Asian. It was not immediately clear when the crime or the subsequent trial and conviction took place.

It was also not immediately clear whether the defendants were represented by legal counsel.

Police say they found the businessman’s body in his refrigerator after friends reported him missing. The defendants, authorities said, had rented an apartment in the victim’s apartment building, eventually crawling through an air conditioning vent to break into his home.

Police caught three of the accused killers as they tried to flee the country, picking them up from an idle plane on the runway about to take off, the report added. Authorities said the defendants confessed to the crime during questioning.

The court’s verdict is likely to be appealable.

While UAE law allows the death penalty in some cases, the death penalty is rarely applied. The last known executions took place in 2011 and 2014, against two men convicted of murder. Attacks on foreigners are also unusual in the United Arab Emirates, which is home to the popular tourist destination of Dubai and where expatriates outnumber Emirati citizens.