London - A British woman locked up in Dubai for having ‘extra-marital sex’ after she told police she had been gang-raped was told she could go home on Tuesday night.
Prosecutors said all charges against the woman - and the two British men arrested with her - had been dropped.
The trio were accused of having sex outside wedlock in breach of Dubai’s strict morality laws, and faced a year in prison. Police and prosecutors refused to believe the 25-year-old’s rape claim - saying a cellphone video ‘showed that the act happened with the consent of the three parties’.
On October 25, the woman, on a five-day holiday to Dubai, walked into a police station and alleged she had been gang-raped two days earlier by David Butlin, 22, and Louis Harris, 24, with whom she had been drinking in a bar. She alleged they attacked her in their £160-a-night hotel room at the Ramada Plaza Jumeirah Beach Resort, and filmed her ordeal on a cellphone.
The men are understood to strenuously deny the claims.
But instead of helping the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, police arrested her and charged her with having ‘consensual sex’ out of marriage and drinking alcohol.
After several days in jail she was finally bailed, but her passport was confiscated and she was forbidden from leaving the country.
Last night the authorities in Dubai said: ‘The office of Dubai Public Prosecutor has closed the case.
A thorough review of statements given by the British woman and the two suspects, as well as the reports of investigating officers from Dubai police, showed that the act happened with the consent of the three parties in question.
‘A video obtained from the mobile phone of one of the suspects detailing the act was a key evidence that supported this conclusion.’
The officials’ statement did not address the extra-marital sex allegation against the British woman, but it is understood that it has also been dropped.
On Tuesday night the woman’s family and supporters said they were awaiting official confirmation amid conflicting reports that she was being allowed home.
The woman, an IT consultant who is separated from her husband of two years, was said to have been ‘petrified’ while she waited for an outcome of the case.
Relatives at home mounted a social media campaign to raise legal funds, saying she needed at least £30,000. On Tuesday night the total stood at £30,501, and it is unclear what will happen to the money now that she faces no further legal action.
Lawyers for market trader Butlin and non-league footballer Harris, who both come from the Midlands, said they too were waiting for official confirmation that the charges had been dropped.
A spokesman said: ‘It is still under investigation and we cannot give more information about the case for legal reasons.’
Daily Mail