ABU DHABI // A labourer admitted strangling a woman to death, telling a court today that she had forced him to have sex with her.
MN, from Bangladesh, told the Criminal Court the woman had appeared at his labour camp and demanded he repay a debt he owed her, claiming that he had made her pregnant and that she had been forced to abort the baby. The two soon started to fight.
"We were wrestling on the floor, then I pressed on her neck for around 5 to 7 minuites, when I saw blood come out of her mouth and nose I stopped, and she was dead," said the labourer.
"Did you have sex with her before she died?" asked Chief Justice Sayed Abdul Baseer, head of the criminal court.
"She forced me," replied the labourer. "When I returned from vacation she invited me to her room, closed the door and forced me to do it. I told her I was newly wed and this was not right but she insisted."
"How did she insist, did she hit you with a shoe?" asked the judge.
The labourer said she undressed him, threatened to make a scene and get him in trouble if he did not comply with her demands. The intercourse took place in the afternoon, while the fatal fight occured in the evening.
Six other Bangladeshi men were accused of not reporting the crime, a charge they denied. They, along with a seventh man, also denied helping the killer evade the authorities.
One of the men said he did not the killer and had never met him before. He said he knew the killer's brother, who works as a cook in Khalidiya police station.
The case was adjourned until November 27 while the killer is appointed a lawyer and the blood relatives are contacted.
hdajani@thenational.ae