Radio 1 DJ Grooverider jailed in Dubai for joint. minimum sentence: 4 years

[klaatu]

Radio 1 DJ jailed on drug charge

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7253514.stm

BBC Radio 1 DJ Grooverider has been jailed for four years in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, for cannabis possession.

The DJ - real name Raymond Bingham - was arrested in November 2007 for flying in for a nightclub gig with 2.16g of cannabis in his luggage.

Bingham denied smuggling drugs, claiming he had left the cannabis in a trouser pocket and forgotten about it.

"Grooverider has paid a very high price for a serious mistake," a spokesman for Radio 1 said.

The 40-year-old has been with the station since 1998 and hosted the weekend drum 'n' bass show with fellow DJ Fabio.

'Ridiculous' arrest

The programme, which has broadcast without him since his arrest, will continue under the title Radio 1's Drum 'n' Bass Show With Fabio.

Grooverider had been employed on a freelance basis and has not been paid by the station since November.

Four years is the minimum sentence for drug trafficking in the UAE.

In the last 12 months, 64 British nationals have been arrested in the UAE for drugs offences

The DJ, who called his arrest "ridiculous" in an interview last month, has two weeks to appeal.

"I must have forgotten the spliff," he said in the interview. "It was a small amount. Back home I would not even get prosecuted."

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Klaatu
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Reputation Comments on this post:

Excellent subject. This is so very wrong.

[lulz]

Damn... Grooverider's not just a Rado 1 DJ, he's a pioneer of drum and bass who has been making music for a long time. "The Prototype Years" was one of the first drum and bass albums I ever owned.

He was crazy for not going through his luggage with a fine toothed comb before travelling to Dubai, but this is still sad to hear.

[Alfa]

This situation is getting totally out of hand. More and more western people are getting caught up into ridiculous, but dramatic situations, while travelling through the region.
The least that should be done now is a ban on events in the UAE by all DJ's and artists until these people are free. Grooverider is not the first from the music industry that is jailed: Dubai court jails US music producer in drugs case

Follow the tag on the bottom to find an overview of many more relating cases.

[Lettish]

It is rather ridiculous. Like that story of a man who had a spec of weed on his shoe that was not visible to the naked eye, got imprisoned. Pathetic.

Swim feels sorry for Grooverider - Swim's a big fan of him and this is unfortunate that this has happened. Swim can't believe it's gonna be 2012 before he is released. There is a Facebook group "Free the Grooverider" (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=20413818168)

Reputation Comments on this post:

Thanks for the facebook link

[lulz]

As agregious as these recent drug related cases (especially the person arrested for posession of melatonin) are, nothing highlights how insane the Dubai legal system is as the case of Alexandre Robert. This poor 15 year old kid got gang raped, and instead of asking if he wanted to press charges, the police accused him of being homosexual (which is a crime in Dubai). http://www.time.com/time/world/artic...680682,00.html

If there was ever a country that needed to smoke a fucking joint...

[Metomni]

Jeez! SWIM had never heard about how stiff their sanctions are over there, he has always just been amazed at the architecture of the country. The world's tallest structure and now they have like 2 more being built that are going to eclipse it, one of which is going to be at least twice as big as the Empire State Building. The other day he was looking at all the different resorts being built there and the insane construction in just the last 20 years and couldn't stop thinking, "DAMN! Where did all the fuckin money to do this come from?"

Maybe their stiff legislation is a way to pay for all the fuckin expanding they're ceaselessly doing over there.

Sad thing really, though, SWIM says that architecture for oppression is a fairly poor trade.

[lulz]

Originally Posted by Metomni

SWIM had never heard about how stiff their sanctions are over there, he has always just been amazed at the architecture of the country.

These photos provide a stunning illustration of just how explosive Dubai's architectural growth has been over the last decade:

http://www.dubai-architecture.info/DUB-GAL1.htm

Dubai has very little oil left, and the oil wells are going to run dry in the next 10-20 years, so they have been furiously developing real estate to try and secure continued foreign investment.

The ruling clan clearly have intelligent advisers on how to maintain future economic wellbeing, but unless they adopt more liberal policies they may well end up a ghost town of opulent skyscapers. They have nothing else to fall back on.

[Metomni]

Yeah, that's the very same article SWIM was reading the other day. It's incredible really. SWIM assumes a lot of their revenue comes from tourism; he wonders how they'll survive if they become so strict no one wants to travel there.

[beefybeef87]

wtf melatonin's not even a drug. I thought Dubai was a cool city, but now I'll never go there.

[PingoTango]

SWIM remembers a story about an unfortunate traveller being detained by Dubai (Dubaian?) customs officials because he had a few poppy seeds on his tie, from a poppy seed bun he had eaten on the aircraft from which he had just alighted.

It's beyond belief - almost medieval, infact.

EDIT: Found the article: http://travel.timesonline.co.uk/tol/...cle3333905.ece

“We even have reports of the imprisonment of a Swiss man for 'possession’ of three poppy seeds on his clothing after he ate a bread roll at Heathrow.”

[enquirewithin]

And it goes on and on. Don't go to Dubai! It's a tasteless rich man's resort in a desert built with virtually slave labour.

TV executive faces jail in Dubai for barely visible cannabis speck

By Amol Rajan
Friday, 22 February 2008

A London-based television executive is facing four years in jail after an amount of cannabis weighing less than a grain of sugar was found in his bag at Dubai airport.

Cat Le-Huy, 31, a German national and head of technology at the television production company Endemol, has been held for three weeks without charge after flying to the United Arab Emirates on 26 January.

Friends and family have been told he can expect to face the minimum jail sentence for drug possession in the tiny Arab emirate. Mr Le-Huy had been on a two-day visit to look into investing in the region. On Tuesday, the Radio 1 DJ Grooverider, whose real name is Raymond Bingham, was jailed in Dubai for four years for possession of 2.16g of cannabis with a street value of about £10.

The Foreign Office says nine British nationals have been detained in Dubai over drugs offences this year, including Keith Brown, from the West Midlands, who was also jailed this month for four years after a speck of cannabis was found stuck to the bottom of a shoe.

Mr Le-Huy, of Belsize Park, north London, said he was first reprimanded for possession of jet-lag pills. When these were shown to be melatonin, which can be bought over the counter in Dubai and in the US, and in herbal stores in Britain, he was asked to provide a urine sample. He said when this also proved negative, his bag was searched. Airport officials found 0.03 grams of hashish, an amount not visible to the naked eye.

Mr Le-Huy is being held in Al-Wathba prison, 40 miles north of Dubai, in a desert. Friends say he has befriended DJ Grooverider, with whom he shares Australian friends, and is also close to several other English-speaking inmates.

A fighting fund has been set up to pay Mr Le-Huy's mounting legal fees, and has already raised £25,000. Mr Le-Huy, who came to Britain 10 years ago, worked at Endemol for two years, including on the reality TV show Big Brother.

Radha Sterling, a close friend of Mr Le-Huy who is co-ordinating the fund, said: "Cat absolutely hates marijuana. He never goes anywhere near it, partly because he's asthmatic and partly because he's very conscious about his health.

"He's a man of integrity, intelligent, respected, and law-abiding. We have asked for independent testing of the dirt in his bag and to know what equipment they are using but they have refused to help us."

Customs authorities have successfully applied to hold Mr Le-Huy in Dubai until at least the end of March. A 5,000-signature appeal has been sent to Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, ruler of Dubai and the Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...ck-785595.html

[dr ACE]

This defies belief! how out of order can you get. This place should be boycotted by all sane thinking people, why would anyone want to travel to a backwards country like that? sounds like a really scary place

and i bet you 90% of all the people arrested are non-muslims/arabs

[klaatu]

Originally Posted by dr ACE

i bet you 90% of all the people arrested are non-muslims/arabs

Dr Ace, sorry but do you have *any* evidence to base that opinion on?

Klaatu

[dr ACE]

Originally Posted by klaatu

Dr Ace, sorry but do you have *any* evidence to base that opinion on?

Klaatu

No i don't i was just making an assumption based on the fact that its strictly against Muslim law for muslims to use drugs of any kind including alcohol. So the majority of people getting caught in a muslim country are obviously going to not be muslims, that's what i based my assumption upon

[Nucking Futs]

Originally Posted by dr ACE

No i don't i was just making an assumption based on the fact that its strictly against Muslim law for muslims to use drugs of any kind including alcohol. So the majority of people getting caught in a muslim country are obviously going to not be muslims, that's what i based my assumption upon

Good come back ! And totally acurate (not as per %ages).

I think the sad bit of this is that he is unlikley to be working for the BBC again. This is a sad fact but look at Angus Deaton! I admit that was coke and whores but still the BBC has an image to uphold. IDK where they get the idea of this image but I would imagine that just like the government the top dogs at the BBC are not intouch with the "normal" person. They feed us TV and we accept this as broadcastings because we are conditioned to!

Interestingly enough and on another subject I notice that as I get older I'm watching more and more "learning" programs. Any one else notice that the older they get the more of a thirst for knowledge they get? I'm 26 BTW so plenty of time to learn.


Regards,

ME.

[Bikelbees]

This kind of story really plays into the trap of look how mental these people are c/w us. Sure, these guys had really taken a rap for such a minor offence, but before we get too hung up about human rights elsewhere, we just gotta get out own house in order, like was said before, a spec of cannabis is bad news in Dubai, and also at the Beeb. We have seen this barbaric foreigners theme all the way since "Midnight Express", but the truth is that AFAIK there isn't a proper country anywhere where you can just walk in with dope, its a global nightmare and whilst I'm all for boycotting these hyper-zealous locations, we can never justifiably smuggly point a finger at these states as primitive whilst we have barbaric laws and penal systems in the so called civilised nations.

[Nucking Futs]

Originally Posted by Bikelbees

This kind of story really plays into the trap of look how mental these people are c/w us. Sure, these guys had really taken a rap for such a minor offence, but before we get too hung up about human rights elsewhere, we just gotta get out own house in order, like was said before, a spec of cannabis is bad news in Dubai, and also at the Beeb. We have seen this barbaric foreigners theme all the way since "Midnight Express", but the truth is that AFAIK there isn't a proper country anywhere where you can just walk in with dope, its a global nightmare and whilst I'm all for boycotting these hyper-zealous locations, we can never justifiably smuggly point a finger at these states as primitive whilst we have barbaric laws and penal systems in the so called civilised nations.

I couldn't agree more! This does display a bit of stupidity on the DJ's behalf also as someone has already mentioned.
THE real question about how to get our own house in order is HOW to do it?
I'm all for direct non violent or illegal action because I belive that its the only way to go about these things. Who would I e mail at the gov to actually ask why cannabis is illegal? gordon.brown@no10.gov.youravinalaughdon'tevenbother/hahaha ?
But really who to email for explanation as to reasons.?

Reputation Comments on this post:

you contradict yourself by labelling your martyr's actions as "stupidity". It was only stupid because of speci...

[dr ACE]

the Home-office is the place you would have to enquire too i'm pretty sure. But there not going to give a straight answer. If the reasons behind why cannabis was made illegal back in the 70s was applied to alcohol today it would not pass go and would definately not pick up a safe for your health sticker of approval.

[Nucking Futs]

Originally Posted by dr ACE

the Home-office is the place you would have to enquire too i'm pretty sure. But there not going to give a straight answer. If the reasons behind why cannabis was made illegal back in the 70s was applied to alcohol today it would not pass go and would definately not pick up a safe for your health sticker of approval.

A question from one person might not prove fruitfull but if there were say ? 40,000 emails to the HO then they might answer something. The only way to get these people to do anything is by presure and lots of it ! I'm in the process of (just an interest atm cos late at night) looking at as many drugs forums as poss por and anti and all those inbetwen and trying to get an idea of numbers in both camps. This again might prove fruitless but you know what happens if i dont do anything?Nothing ! I am patonate (even if i cant spell) about the legall status of ganja cos I would like to try it one day as I have heared many great things about it but wouldnt break the law u c.

If you care then do something similar. The whole forum should but thats an alfa issue.

Regards

ME.

PS sorry bout hijacking t thread.

[directdetox]

Why are they so strict? I mean it was really stupid of him to have it on him, but seriously? Poppy seeds?

[Nucking Futs]

Originally Posted by directdetoxdotcom

Why are they so strict? I mean it was really stupid of him to have it on him, but seriously? Poppy seeds?

The DJ - real name Raymond Bingham - was arrested in November 2007 for flying in for a nightclub gig with 2.16g of cannabis in his luggage.


Hope this helps clear things up for you.

[directdetox]

No I understand that, lol. I was just commenting on two posts at once. Sorry. I just think it's really stupid to persecute someone for that. Then again, I'm not from there. I have a client who brokers cars over there from the USA to Canada, to Dubai. I ship car titles there all the time! Man! Next time I have a poppy muffin, maybe I'll drop a few seeds by accident lol, right into the FEDEX envelope!

[Nucking Futs]

Originally Posted by directdetoxdotcom

Why are they so strict?

Try to think of it like this. The counry (UAE) is DF. The powers that be (the government) in our case are the mods and admin make the rules they want. If you do things you shouldn't here (break the rules) then your in for trouble. Same goes there with laws (our rules). The difference is I chose to be here and abide by the rules (try to). In the country in question you don't have the option. Does that make sence?

Regards,

ME.

[enquirewithin]

Originally Posted by Nucking Futs

Try to think of it like this. The counry (UAE) is DF. The powers that be (the government) in our case are the mods and admin make the rules they want. If you do things you shouldn't here (break the rules) then your in for trouble. Same goes there with laws (our rules). The difference is I chose to be here and abide by the rules (try to). In the country in question you don't have the option. Does that make sence?

Regards,

ME.

Sure-- all the more reason NOT to go there and help such a place to exist and prosper.

I remember being told that the Koran does not expressly forbid cannabis, as it dose alcohol. The problem is nothing to do with Islam as such, just the tyrannical regimes that oil keeps in power.

[Nucking Futs]

Originally Posted by enquirewithin

Sure-- all the more reason NOT to go there and help such a place to exist and prosper.

I remember being told that the Koran does not expressly forbid cannabis, as it dose alcohol. The problem is nothing to do with Islam as such, just the tyrannical regimes that oil keeps in power.

Hi,

To say that people should not go to these places is IMO not a very good comment. It's easy to forget with our shared points of harm reduction and tollerance that a great many people choose not to take any recreational drugs at all and do not drink. Why should they not visit these places when there is no danger for them? If i don't like the beer in a cirtain pub then I would go to another one. Thats not to say that some of the population would not prefer the beer in the first pub. As free as we are we can choose.

Regards,

ME.