03 June 2021 :

A Keralite who was awaiting capital execution in the United Arab Emirates for causing the death of a young boy got a new lease of life as NRI tycoon M A Yusuff Ali extended a helping hand by paying a compensation (blood money) of Rs 10 million (500,000 dirhams) to the victim's family.
Becks Krishnan, 45, a native of Puthenchira in Thrissur district, has been languishing in Al Wathba prison in Abu Dhabi for the past seven years as the UAE Supreme Court sentenced him to capital punishment in 2013.
Becks Krishnan was working with a private company in Abu Dhabi when he was involved in the incident. On 7 September 2012, he was driving to Musaffah to attend a job-related meeting when he lost control over the wheel and the car rammed into a group of kids playing on the roadside. A young Sudani boy died in the accident and the Abu Dhabi police slapped murder charges against him. The police collected CCTV footage as proof and the court awarded the death penalty.
As all their efforts to save him failed, the family approached NRI businessman M A Yusuff Ali with the help of Bharatiya Janata Party leader Sethumadhavan. Meanwhile, the family of the victim had returned and settled in Sudan, which made efforts for mediation impossible.
Yusuff Ali collected the whereabouts of the family in Sudan and flew down to the African country, where he succeeded in convincing the family of the victim to pardon Krishnan after extensive parleys. He brought the family of the victim to Abu Dhabi for talks at one stage. In January 2021, the family of the victim agreed to pardon Krishnan and Yusuff Ali paid a compensation of 5 lakh dirhams. Krishnan is expecting release soon and he will be returning to Kerala, said a relative.
Krishnan told Indian Embassy officials who visited him for sanctioning his out pass that it was a rebirth for him and he had lost hope of meeting his family.
He said he was waiting to meet Yusuff Ali and convey his gratitude for saving him from the noose.
Yusuff Ali, who thanked the Almighty for saving Becks Krishnan, wished him peace and good luck.

14 April 2021 :

The Sharjah Court of Appeal has reduced a sentence of death issued against a 34-year-old Asian accused of killing his roommate to seven years in prison, Khaleej Times reported on 14 April 2021.
The accused was also found guilty of attempting to murder the nephew of the victim as well as of consuming alcohol. The court further ordered that he be deported after the completion of his term.
The ruling came after the victim's family pardoned the accused after he agreed to pay Dh200,000 as legal blood money to the deceased's heirs.
According to the police investigation, the accused used a kitchen knife to kill the victim while he was asleep in his bed.
He also assaulted the nephew of the victim violently, causing serious injuries that necessitated his transfer to the hospital for treatment.
The Public Prosecution referred the accused to trial and charged him with premeditated murder for killing the victim and attempting to kill another person by assaulting him with a knife. He was stopped from committing the second murder by other roommates, who intervened.
The criminal court had earlier issued a death sentence against the accused on the charge of premeditated murder and ordered that the execution be carried out in the presence of the victim's family.

20 December 2021 :

The Criminal Court of Abu Dhabi has sentenced a Pakistani expatriate to death for possessing narcotic and psychotropic substances with the intention of promoting them, Gulf News reported on 20 December 2021.
The court has also ordered the confiscation and destruction of the seized products, as well as the confiscation of the car and telephone used in the crime.
The Anti-Narcotics Section in Abu Dhabi received information about the accused being involved in the promotion of narcotic and psychotropic substances.
He was in touch with a drug trafficker abroad and used to deliver large consignments of drugs to him through other people residing in the UAE.
The contraband items were concealed in different locations before their photos and contact details were sent to the dealer who, in turn, passed on the information to others through WhatsApp, who would then collect the consignments, divide them into smaller packages and redistribute the details of the items to potential buyers.
Following investigations, Abu Dhabi Police notified Abu Dhabi Public Prosecution to obtain an arrest warrant against the suspect and to search his home and vehicle.
A police team was sent to the accused person’s home, a search was conducted and he was arrested.
A suspicious crystallised substance was recovered from the suspect, which, after examination, turned out to be a prohibited psychotropic substance. A phone that the suspect was using to promote drugs on social media was also confiscated.

07 October 2021 :

The Ajman Criminal Court on 4 October 2021 sentenced five Asians to death for the premeditated murder of an Asian businessman and for stealing Dh109,000 from his apartment in Ajman.
The accused include Q.M, 39; M.T, 25; A.M, 21; T.S, 27; and J.S, 26, who was charged in absentia.
The court also fined them Dh109,000 and referred the civil claim to the civil court.
Lawyer Awatif Mohammed from Al Rowaad Advocates, representing the victim’s family – his wife, three children and parents – said: “They could have stolen the money and left but instead they waited for him to return home, restrained him, wrapped a cable around his neck then stabbed him repeatedly before stuffing his body inside the fridge.”
Police had received a report from an Asian man stating that his friend, the businessman, was missing. When he did not answer his mobile phone, the friend went to his apartment and knocked on the door, but there was no answer.
A police patrol was sent to the residence of the victim. During the search, police found the body in the refrigerator. It turned out that the person inside the refrigerator was the person who was absent in the report, and he was the owner of the building.
After reviewing surveillance cameras and conducting investigations, the perpetrators were identified - they were tenants of a flat in the victim’s building.
Security footage showed the victim entering his apartment and then two people following him into the apartment. After about two and a half hours, five people were seen leaving the apartment - three of them went to their own apartment, and two people went to the roof of the building.
A police alert about the accused found that three of them were aboard a plane that was on the runway. The plane was stopped and the accused were arrested, along with their co-accused from the flat.
Upon questioning the third defendant in the Public Prosecution’s investigations about the incident, he confessed that he had committed the murder and theft with the help of the four defendants. They planned to kill and rob the victim because he was a businessman who kept large sums of money at his apartment.
The three men entered the apartment from the roof of the building through the air conditioning vent an hour before the victim had entered. After they found the money, they waited for him and then stabbed him several times in different parts of his body.
After ascertaining his death, they washed the body and the apartment from the traces of blood, put the body inside the refrigerator and then left the victim’s apartment.
They went to their apartment, changed their clothes, threw them in the trash outside the building, then hid in another emirate for a while before going to the airport to try to leave the UAE.

14 September 2021 :

An Emirati drug addict in Al Ain has been sentenced to death for killing his father after the victim allegedly refused to give him money to buy drugs, Khaleej Times reported on 13 September 2021.
The young man had stabbed his father 36 times in different parts of the body using a blunt object which caused his death. The incident took place after Taraweeh prayer during Ramadan this year.
The Al Ain Criminal Court of First Instance has handed down the death sentence to the killer after he was found guilty of premeditated murder. The victim’s aggrieved family had refused to pardon the killer in return for blood money and insisted on retribution.
Police investigations showed that the Emirati would routinely ask his father for money. Sometimes, his father would grant the request and sometimes, he would refuse, knowing that his son would use it to buy psychoactive substances.
Eyewitnesses told authorities that the accused used to beat his father whenever he refused to give him the money he needed to buy drugs. The young man, who was an ex-convict in a drug abuse case, had earlier been placed in a rehab clinic.
On the day of the murder, the Emirati lured his father into the courtyard of the house under the pretext of talking to him about something. “As soon as the victim came closer to him, the accused stabbed him 36 times with a blunt object in different parts of his body,” said prosecutors.
Witnessing the incident from the balcony of his room, the accused's brother rushed down, placed his father in his car and tried to take him to the hospital. However, the defendant, who used his own vehicle, hurriedly blocked his brother's way and crashed his car against his brother's vehicle several times till it was too damaged to move.
The second brother, who was outside the house, alerted the police about the incident after hearing his father screaming.
The victim's brother, who was also nearby, ran to rescue his brother. He tried to take him to the hospital, but the latter died by the time he got him there.
The Family Prosecution in Al Ain had charged the Emirati with premeditated murder. He was also charged with deliberately damaging his brother's vehicle to prevent his father from getting the emergency medical assistance required. The man was further accused of consuming a psychoactive substance ("Pregabalin").
Prosecutors had requested that the maximum sentence be given to the accused, considering that the victim being his father constituted an aggravating circumstance.
The Emirati’s lawyer had argued that his client committed the crime under the influence of drugs and wasn’t aware of his actions. The accused had told prosecutors that he couldn’t remember any of the facts of the crime.
However, a medical committee that examined the defendant refuted his claims and confirmed that the accused was responsible for his actions and statements at the time of the incident.

13 June 2021 :

An Indian expat on death row in the UAE returned home on 9 June 2021 after languishing in jail for almost nine years in a road accident case.
Becks Krishnan, a Keralite, faced capital punishment for causing the death of a Sudanese boy in September 2012. His release was secured following the intervention of Lulu Group chairman M.A. Yusuff Ali, who paid Dh500,000 as compensation in court.
Lulu Group International is a multinational conglomerate company that operates a chain of hypermarkets and retail companies, headquartered in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. It was founded in 2000 by M. A. Yusuff Ali who hails from Nattika, Thrissur district in Kerala.
Lulu Group has now offered Krishnan a job.
Yusuff Ali said: “He has been offered a suitable job anywhere in our organisation. Our intention was to let him spend quality time with family without having to worry about his future. Whenever he wishes to start working, he will have a job ready at one of our establishments. The job location can be anywhere in our organisation as per his wish.”
Krishnan departed from Abu Dhabi on 8 June night, and reached Kochi early morning on 9 June.
“This is a second lease of life for me. I am very happy. I am back home because of Yusuff Ali. Ever since he intervened in my case, I had renewed hope in my life,” Krishnan, who hails from Thrissur district, said after landing at the Kochi International Airport.
There were emotional scenes as Krishnan’s wife Veena and son Advaith received Krishnan at the airport.
“I am grateful to Yusuff sir and family,” Veena said.
Once home, Krishnan’s mother broke down seeing her son.
Even since 2012, Krishnan’s family and friends have been trying for his release from prison but without any success. The family then approached Yusuff Ali, who took up the matter, flew down the victim’s family from Sudan to Abu Dhabi for a month and held extensive discussions to arrive at a compensation amount and secure pardon for Krishnan.
Yusuff Ali pointed out the act of kindness was not following his chopper accident in April but the result of a long-drawn process involving multiple stakeholders.
M.A. Yusuff Ali, his wife and five others on 11 April 2021 had a miraculous escape after a private chopper they were travelling belly-landed in a swamp at Panangad, near Kochi, in Kerala. All seven passengers including two pilots were admitted at the Lakeshore Hospital, Kumbalam, near Kochi, with minor injuries.
“I am not trying to do ‘sadaqa’ (charity) following my chopper accident. I paid the compensation amount in January. He is a young man and has a family. You can’t measure the value of a life with money. Now he has reached home,” Yusuff Ali said.