5 Dubai restaurant staff steal cash, meals worth Dh108,000

Dubai - The witness told the prosecutor that one day, he caught the defendants off guard eating stolen meals during the lunch break.

Five former workers at a restaurant are standing trial at the Dubai Court of First Instance on charges of theft.
Prosecutors accused the five Filipinos, including a woman, aged between 25 and 36, of stealing a total of Dh108,000 worth cash, food and juices.
The thefts were discovered on July 9. A complaint was filed at Bur Dubai police station.
The 31-year-old restaurant manager, a Kenyan, said the defendants included the main female accused (a supervisor), a cook and three waiters. "In March, I noticed that many customers would turn up and pay in cash. However, at the end of the working day, the revenues in cash would be low."
The manager alerted the owner. "We then told someone to come to the restaurant and buy food and pay a Dh100 bill, which we marked. At the end of the day when we checked the cash register, we did not find that bill. The transaction was not put in the e-system either," he recounted.
The manager and the owner then checked the surveillance cameras and they were surprised to see that the five staff had been stealing cash, meals and juices.
The main female accused would steal the amounts of money and keep it with her. "At the end of their shifts, she would split it with those employees," the manager recalled.
The witness told the prosecutor that one day, he caught the defendants off guard eating stolen meals during the lunch break. They asked him then to forgive them and not to report them to the owner.
After confronting them with the footage, they confessed in writing that they stole cash money and meals.
During the public prosecution investigation, the defendants admitted to abusing their jobs to steal meals and money from the cash register.
A waiter confessed the thefts would happen at night and during the lunch break, in coordination with a cook. They would collect the money from customers and pocket it rather than put it in the records.
The cook said he was then new and claimed the supervisor allowed him to give the meals away.
"Most of those meals were orders prepared and later cancelled by the customers," he said.
A report from an auditing office showed that Dh108,000 worth of products, including cash, were stolen from the restaurant.
As many as 10 video clips that showed the theft incidents, on different occasions, were used as pieces of evidence by the public prosecution.
The trial has been adjourned to September 30.
mary@khaleejtimes.com

• Dubai