A Dubai Misdemeanour Court has fined a European man AED 1,000 after convicting him of assaulting a two-year-old boy at a shopping mall play area.
The incident took place in October last year, when an Asian father filed a police complaint accusing a European man in his 60s of slapping his young son during a dispute between the boy and the man’s daughter, Al Khaleej Arabic daily reported.
According to the complaint, the father rushed to the play zone after hearing his son cry and saw the child pointing toward the defendant, who appeared to ignore him while playing with his daughter. The father continued to observe from a distance and claimed the man later approached the child again and slapped him, causing the boy to fall against a wall, resulting in bruises and emotional distress.
The defendant, however, denied the allegation, stating that he had only tried to move the boy away from his daughter, who had been disturbed by the child several times, and that any physical contact was unintentional. He also claimed that the child’s father had later attacked him.
While the medical report did not confirm visible injuries, the court held that the absence of physical marks did not dismiss the occurrence of an assault.
In its judgment, the court ruled that the man’s action constituted an intentional and voluntary assault, making him legally accountable under UAE law.
