A Doha criminal court has sentenced a Bangladeshi man in absentia to one year in jail upon arrest, local Arabic daily Arrayah reported on Friday.
The defendant had stolen the passports of his colleagues, besides a sum of QR3,700, and their mobile phones and then returned to his country with the booty.
Investigations revealed that the defendant had asked one of his roommates for the room key as he wanted to go back early. So he took the key and grabbed the passports, the money and the mobile phones and flew out of Qatar without telling anybody.
Later, he called them from his home country and demanded they should pay him QR1,500 each to get their passports. They refused to pay him and reported the matter to the police.
In due course, a person who came from Bangladesh returned the stolen passports to their owners. He testified that the defendant gave him the passports at a police station back home to deliver them to those concerned in Doha. Based on the testimony of the victims and witnesses the court convicted the defendant in absentia.
