Dubai: A sports coach has been accused of threatening to kill his ex-wife by banging her head if she did not withdraw her police complaint against him.
The American coach allegedly threatened his Egyptian ex-wife that he would go to the gym where she works, pull her from her hair and beat her to death if she did not drop her case against him in August.
The ex-wife came to know about the death threats when her countrywoman friend, who is a lawyer, told her over the phone that the coach had conveyed the verbal threats through her [the lawyer].
On hearing this the woman lodged a complaint against her ex-husband at a police station.
The prosecutors charged the suspect of verbally threatening to kill his ex-wife but he pleaded not guilty when he appeared before the Dubai Court of First Instance.
The ex-wife testified to prosecutors that her friend, the lawyer, told her over the phone about the death threats.
“She called me and warned me about the suspect … she told me that he had called her and threatened that he would beat me and kill me. She told me that he said over the phone ‘I would go the gym where she [ex-wife] works to assault and kill her’. He made those threats because he wanted me back as his wife, but I had refused,” she told to prosecutors.
The lawyer testified to prosecutors that her friend and the coach had constant fights before they got divorced.
“Since she wanted to put an end to the suspect’s constant pestering and offensiveness, she came to me for a legal advice because I am a lawyer. I called up the man and introduced myself as the claimant’s friend on which he shouted over the phone. He claimed that he had not divorced her yet and that he was angry because she [ex-wife] had lodged a defamation case against him at a police station. In later calls and messages he threatened to kill her on which I told my friend about it,” she told prosecutors.
The trial continues.
