DUBAI // A farmer arrested with a bag containing 60 capsules of heroin said he was keeping it safe for a friend.
“A friend had given me a bag to keep until he returns to pick it up and I didn’t know it contained heroin,” the Pakistani expatriate, 27, told Dubai Criminal Court.
Police say they were tipped off that he was offering to sell heroin for Dh13,110, and they set up a sting operation on June 28 last year in Al Awir, Dubai.
They say the farmer admitted being contacted by a Pakistani convict who ordered him to collect the heroin, which was stashed in a rubbish bin in Fujairah. Prosecutors say he took the drugs back to Dubai and sold them to a customer who was in fact an undercover anti-narcotics officer.
Police say he handed the officer a plastic bag containing 60 capsules of heroin, and during the arrest he threw away the money the undercover officer paid him.
The farmer denies possessing the drugs with intent to sell. The next hearing is on March 30.
salamir@thenational.ae
