A maid in Ras Al Khaimah was charged over the weekend with strangling her newborn, police said today.
Police said the maid, from an unnamed African country, put the baby in a bag and dropped it in a rubbish chute after delivering a child conceived out of wedlock last month. A police source said forensics tests showed the baby was strangled, then placed in a bag.
She gave birth in a bathroom of her employers' home, the source said. The baby was found by a rubbish collector at the apartment building where she worked for a family from an Arabic country.
"The garbage collector saw some blood from a bag in the garbage, and when he opened the bag, he saw the baby and he called the police," said Lt Thaer Najjar of the RAK Police Department.
The family said that they did not know she was pregnant and that the maid went to the supermarket and did not return.
She was found with friends in Sharjah after a tip from a taxi driver who had driven her there. Police said they arrested her within 90 minutes of the crime report.
The woman had absconded from her Sharjah sponsor and worked illegally in RAK, officials said. The father of the child is believed to be in Sharjah.
A police source said the family was facing charges of hiring an illegal maid.
salamir@thenational.ae
azacharias@thenational.ae
