Radio DJ Grooverider jailed

British Radio 1 DJ Grooverider has been jailed for four years in Dubai for possesion of drugs. The 40-year-old, real name Raymond Bingham, was arrested at the city’s airport on November 23 after flying in for a nightclub gig. Officials found 2.16 grams of cannabis in his luggage he had ‘forgotten’. Recently, Dubai City Magazine already posted this much commented article.

DJ Grooverider has been with Radio 1 since 1998 and co-hosts the weekly Fabio and Grooverider show at 2am each Sunday. Since his arrest, Radio 1 continued the show without him.

In the last 12 months, 64 British nationals have been arrested in the UAE for drugs offences, according to the Foreign Office. Grooverider has two weeks to appeal.

Tourists facing Dubai jail

Western tourists oblivious to the severe drugs laws in the United Arab Emirates often end up in jail after arriving in Dubai with tiny amounts of narcotics for their own use. A few cases showed tourists who faced imprisonment for a minimum of four years, caught with small amounts of narcotics.

In 2006, US hip-hop music producer Dallas Austin was sentenced to four years in jail after he was found in possession of 1.26 grammes of cocaine and other banned substances. The composer, who had come to Dubai for a three-day birthday party for British supermodel Naomi Campbell, was pardoned by Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashed al-Maktoum immediately after his sentence was pronounced.

Bert Tatham was imprisoned for four years in Dubai last June after he was arrested during a stopover from Afghanistan, when officials found two poppy flowers in his luggage and 0.6 grammes of hashish in his clothes. He was also charged with having traces of drugs in his urine. Also in June, a 24-year-old Italian tourist landed a four-year jail term followed by deportation after being found in possession of 0.01 grammes of hashish, which he said he had forgotten in a jacket pocket.

Keith Brown was travelling through the United Arab Emirates on his way to England when he was stopped. A search by customs officials uncovered a speck of cannabis weighing just 0.003 gram, which would be invisible to the naked eye and weighing less than a grain of sugar, on the tread of one of his shoes. He was sentenced to four years imprisonment.

Last week, Cat Le-Huy was arrested on arrival at the Dubai airport. Cat Le-Huy, head of technology with Big Brother production company Endemol, was arrested on suspicion of possessing illegal drugs after customs officers found melatonin, a health supplement used for jet lag available over the counter both in Dubai and in the US. Authorities also claim they discovered fragments of hashish. Fair Trials International said the amount was 0.01g.

“There are over a million British tourists a year coming to the UAE,” said Simon Goldsmith, spokesman at the British Embassy in Dubai. “We have a travel advice making it clear that the penalty is very severe for drug possession.”