Appellate court in Sharjah rejects Clayton Rodrigues’ appeal

Sharjah court rejects DJ's appeal in drugs smuggling case, framed by baker & associate. Family plans to file further appeal.

MUMBAI: An appellate court in Sharjah has rejected the appeal filed by city disc jockey Clayton Rodrigues, who was purportedly framed in a drugs smuggling case by a Borivali-based baker Anthony Paul and his associate Rajesh Bobhate. Clayton, also a Borivali resident, was arrested in Sharjah on February 6 and sentenced to 25 years’ imprisonment after he was found carrying a cake laced with drugs.

Appellate court in Sharjah rejects Clayton Rodrigues’ appeal

A senior police officer said that the appellate court had rejected Clayton’s appeal last week, and the family was now planning to file a further appeal before the Supreme Court of the country.

In April, the Mumbai police’s Crime Branch had arrested Paul and his associate Bobhate aka Ravi for framing actor Chrisann Pereira using a similar modus operandi. The case against Pereira was dropped and she was released from the Sharjah jail after the Mumbai police arrested Paul and Bobhate and provided all the documents to her lawyer to produce in the Sharjah court. The appellate court has, however, refused to accept the evidence collected by the Crime Branch in Clayton’s case and has dismissed his appeal.

The Crime Branch investigation revealed that on January 28, Clayton received a call from one Prasad Rao, who told him that he was from a recruiting agency and wanted to offer Clayton a job at their club in Sahara Star, for which he would have to give a demo to his bosses in Dubai. Clayton met Rao the next day at a coffee shop to discuss the offer.

Clayton left his house at 12.30 am on February 6 and went to pick up the cake from Rao, who specifically told him to put the cake inside his luggage. At 2.30 pm, when Paul went to Clayton’s house to pick up his wallet which he had purportedly left there, Falyn received a message from Rao’s number that Clayton had been arrested in Sharjah for being in possession of drugs.

Paul then pretended to make a few calls and told Falyn that the authorities in Sharjah were demanding ₹80 lakh to release Clayton. “I asked Paul to talk to my brother-in-law but he refused, saying that his name should not be revealed,” she said. “Till March 25, he kept calling me on WhatsApp, telling me to arrange for the money for Clayton’s release, which had by then fallen to ₹15 lakh. It sounds like a movie plot, but it was an extremely well-planned frame-up. We did not even think of foul play.”

Falyn had known Paul’s girlfriend through work since 2012 and was introduced to Paul in 2018. “When they broke up, Paul had called Clayton to help patch things up, as he wanted to marry her,” she said. “Paul even invited us to a farmhouse in Vajreshwari for a weekend to thank us for our help.”

Paul’s girlfriend was earlier married to his cousin and had a son from the marriage. This son, Falyn said, would often remark that Clayton reminded him of his father, which had irked Paul. “Throughout the trip to the farm, Paul was furious,” she said. “He also felt that it was bizarre that Clayton reminded the child of his father.” This reportedly was the reason Paul sought revenge and framed Clayton, just as he had framed Pereira earlier on account of a disagreement with her.