DUBAI // A Briton denied kicking his neighbour's German shepherd puppy in the snout, breaking a tooth, a Dubai court heard this morning.
The 50-year-old DF, an engineer for a private company who lives in Mirdiff, admitted to consuming liquor without a license. Prosecutors charged him with drinking alcohol illegally, trespassing and assaulting a house animal.
Records said DF drank a few bottles of beer, then climbed through a window into his Egyptian neighbour's backyard about 9:30pm on November 8. In the backyard, he kicked the five-month-old dog severely in the head, prosecutors said.
KB, a 26-year-old clerk who lives with his sister and her husband, the dog's owners, heard the animal barking with pain and looked outside of the window to check on him. That is when he spotted DF allegedly kicking the animal, named Max.
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"I tried to catch him but he fled to his apartment," said KB, a clerk at a private hospital in Dubai.
Max was taken to a veterinarian at the European Veterinary Center, who said in his report that the dog's gums and left eye were damaged, and that Max was missing a temporary canine tooth because of an external physical trauma.
DF, however, told prosecutors that he opened his window to clean it and the dog attacked him. He said he pushed the dog away twice in an attempt to defend himself.
He admitted to police that he slapped the dog on the snout and returned to his villa through the window.
He testified at Al Rashidiya police station that the dog barked continuously, night and day, and that he told his neighbour to move the dog.
Max's owner, MZ, 36, testified that he went to DF's villa to ask him about the incident, and DF confessed to jumping into the yard and attacking the dog. At that point he called the police.
The next hearing will be on May 30.
salamir@thenational.ae
