Two men who allegedly lured a housemaid - together with their accomplice who is at large - to abscond from her employer and then tried to force her into prostitution, were charged in the Court of First Instance with human trafficking.

The two Bangladeshis, aged 30 and 25, have also been accused of helping the runaway accomplice in the flat he was using as a prostitution den, by showing customers how to reach there. They used to collect between Dh90 and Dh100 a day for their help.

The duo was nabbed by the police on June 21 when they sold the victim, an Ethiopian, to a police informant for Dh3,400.

The victim said an Indonesian woman promised her a job with a salary between Dh3,000 and Dh5,000. "I was working as a maid in Abu Dhabi and she encouraged me and another maid to run away."

At around 4:30am, the two accused - after luring her into fleeing - took her in their car to a flat in Dubai where the Indonesian woman and another of the same nationality received her.

"I stayed there for a week. They took the other maid and bought her clothes which were very indecent. I was told those would be for the job but I told them to look for a maid job for me and I would not accept any other occupation," the victim said.

The victim added: "About five days later, the runaway accused picked her up and drove a car with the two other men. He drove for about 10 minutes and then stopped. When he stepped off, the police raided the car and arrested them".

"We had reliable information that a Bangladeshi man was about to sell an Ethiopian woman for Dh3,400 to use her in prostitution," a lieutenant from the Dubai police human trafficking section, told the prosecutor.

"One of our sources made contact with the suspect (the 30-year-old accused) and asked to see the woman's picture on WhatsApp. Our source pretended he was interested in buying her for Dh3,400. By that time, we had obtained a public prosecution warrant to arrest the suspects, free the victim, search the suspects' flat and apprehend all involved."

The suspect met the police informant in Al Karama Park parking lots and collected the money from him. He tried to flee when the police raided the place but he was caught.

The two other accomplices, who were in the car, also tried to run away. One of them was apprehended.

Source: Khaleej Times