Pair jailed for steamy SMSes

2010-03-17 21:10

Dubai – Two Emirates Airline cabin crew members in Dubai were given three-month jail terms for exchanging sexy text messages, a local daily reported on Wednesday.

The then-married flight attendant, 42, and her male supervisor, 47, were convicted of "coercion to commit sin," the National daily reported court documents as saying.

It said the pair – both Indian – were earlier sentenced to six months in prison to be followed by deportation, but an appeals court last week reduced the jail time and dropped the expulsion penalty.

The court concluded there was not enough evidence to prove that the unidentified pair had actually been sexually involved, the paper added.

The messages were exposed during a bitter divorce battle between the attendant and her husband that began in 2007, the daily said.

It said the divorce court had ordered Dubai's telecommunications company, Etisalat, to produce the text messages after the husband accused his wife of an affair.

Criminal complaint

Etisalat provided copies of SMS messages in October 2008, allowing the husband to file a "criminal complaint" against his wife, the paper said.

The court also handed a three-month jail term to the attendant's sister for perjury, after she claimed she had been having the affair and had been using her sister's telephone.

The attendant's husband has since gained custody of the couple's four-year-old son after the divorce was finalised, the paper reported.

Dubai, a regional tourist hub with a large non-Muslim expatriate population and the Gulf's most liberal social policies, nevertheless continues to apply strict rules based on Islamic shari'ah law .

A British pair await a final verdict from Dubai's appeals court next month to find out if they will serve a one-month jail sentence over charges of kissing in public.

A British mother-of-two lost custody of her children and was jailed for three months last year on adultery charges filed by her then Egyptian husband.

- SAPA