Dubai: A worker has been sentenced to death for the murder of two Indian expatriates Hiren Adhiya and Vidhi Adhiya in their villa in Dubai.
According to the Dubai Court of First Instance, the 26-year-old Pakistani worker stabbed the couple when they were asleep in their home on June 15, 2020.
He had done some maintenance jobs at their villa a year earlier and had been stalking the family for some time. During that visit, he had seen a lot of loose cash at the house. He was looking for an opportune time to steal the money and when he though he got the chance, he killed the couple too.
The worker stabbed the man 10 times, the wife 14 times. Both died of their injuries. He also stabbed their elder daughter as he sought to escape, but she survived the ordeal and managed to call the police. The worker was arrested within 24 hours.
“I bought a knife from a Sharjah supermarket and paid a driver Dh70 to drive me to the area. I waited outside the villa on the pavement from 7pm until 11pm before climbing into the villa’s garden. I waited for another two hours for the family to fall asleep,” the defendant told police during interrogation.
He took off his shoes and sneaked in through an unlocked door, searching for money. He stole Dh1,965 from a wallet he found on the first floor. He then remembered the amount of cash he saw in the couple’s bedroom when he visited for maintenance work. He then entered the room and began searching for the money in a drawer next to Hiren Adhiya.
Hiren woke up at the sound of the drawer being opened. “I opened the drawer next to the husband’s head when he woke up. I raised the knife and stabbed him several times on several parts of his body. His wife woke up and I stabbed her too,” the defendant said.
At the couple cried for help, their 18-year-old elder daughter woke up and came in to check on them. The worker stabbed her also in the neck and ran away. “I threw the knife away in the sand and walked until I reached the Dubai-Al Ain Road. I called the person who dropped me off to take me back to Sharjah,” the defendant said.
The man was charged with double murder, attempted murder of the couple’s daughter and robbery.
The verdict will be subject to appeal within 15 days.
