Lankan jailed for molesting girl on flight to Dubai

13 March 2015 03:18 am

A drunken Sri Lankan passenger has been jailed for one year for molesting a sleeping female teenager on a Dubai-bound flight.


He will be deported after serving his jail term. On November 5 last year, 13-year old victim was travelling alone from Sri Lanka to Dubai.


When the flight crew turned off the lights, the girl bent on the front table and asleep on her seat. The 45-year-old salesman sitting next to her was consuming alcohol and sexually assaulted her.


The girl was taken aback and shouted at him, pushing him away several times. He stopped harassing when the lights were turned on. However, when it was dark he resumed to abuse her sexually and groped her private parts.


The girl in her statement told the investigators, "He insisted on groping me although I pushed his hand and shouted at him. When the lights were switched on, he tried to convince me, but I did not talk to him. As the lights were switched off, he groped me again and went on harassing me. I got very scared and did not know what to do as I was travelling alone."


The accused followed the victim at Dubai Airport after landing. She rushed to a washroom to avoid him. A concerned woman noticed the girl and enquired why she was distressed. The girl narrated everything that happened in the plane and that her assaulter was following her in the airport.


The woman accompanied the girl to a security officer to report the incident.  The officer told the girl's father who was waiting for her at the arrival hall.    


Police arrested the passenger and found out that he was drunk. Drugs for personal use were confiscated from him, a charge that he is being prosecuted for in a separate case. (Emirates24/7)