Within days of meeting, Kiwi high-flier Toby Carroll had nicknamed his new girlfriend Kitty Cat and told her she had “hijacked” his mind.
But what began as an impetuous romance has led to them both serving time in a Dubai jail for having sex outside of marriage – which is illegal there – alongside Toby’s former girlfriend, who lost her temper when she caught them together.
Danielle (31), a former lap dancer from the UK, has spoken of her ill-fated meeting with the 32-year-old Kiwi banker in a bar just before Christmas. They exchanged phone numbers and she says she agreed to a date with Toby, unaware that his long-term girlfriend, Brazilian Priscila Ferreira (25), was still on the scene.
Toby took Danielle to the exclusive Dubai oarina Yacht Club. After one more date she agreed to go back to his place.
“The evening had been wonderful, we’d been out to dinner and talked about our lives in Dubai. We had a lot in common. He was charming, intelligent, had a good job and a top-of-the-range Porsche. He was quite a catch,” says Danielle.
once inside his apartment, they retired to the bedroom where they’d shed their clothes. They were kissing when Priscila came in.
“I saw this white floaty garment and heard a loud voice. I thought the TV had come on. Suddenly I felt someone land on my back and grab my hair. Toby yelled, ‘Stop it Priscila. What are you doing?'”
But instead of trying to fight back, Danielle says she stayed dead still.
“I didn’t move because I had just paid $500 for hair extensions and I didn’t want them falling out two days before Christmas,” she explains.
But then Priscila grew furious, says Danielle, and bit her arm.
“Toby was trying to pull her off me and she went to take her shoe off so she could hit us with it. I wriggled free and dashed into the bathroom and locked the door.”
When Toby called the police, neither he nor Danielle believed they could also be in trouble. But the trio spent six weeks in police cells while Dubai authorities decided what charges should be laid.
Although both Toby and Danielle protested that they had just been kissing, a Dubai court last month accepted the police prosecutor’s DNA evidence of sexual activity.
Now they have all been sent back to prison. Toby has been sentenced to two months and will be deported once he’s released, but he has appealed his sentence. Both Priscila and Danielle will serve 30 days in prison.
Incredibly, the love rivals became friends during their first stint behind bars when they were forced to share a mattress.
“We were given a narrow bunk and told to share,” recalls Danielle, who realised they were going to have to get along.
“We just had to become friends because it was such a terrible experience. All we had was each other for comfort and at night we would huddle together on our mattress.
“The conditions were terrible. It was very cramped. They put tranquillisers in the food. We could only bathe once a week. There were insects everywhere. There were women with babies. There were no windows, no fresh air. Some women were arrested for trying to commit suicide.
“A lot of the time we would sit on our bunk, whispering in low voices about how we got there. one night a fight broke out with women punching each other and pulling hair.
“Against them, Priscila seemed to be the only one I could trust. At least I knew her background and what she’d done to get in there.
“We were in a stinking room with murderers. I got to know Priscila well and liked her. There are no hard feelings. I have forgiven her for what she did.”
While former Auckland Grammar boy Toby is hoping that his appeal for the two-month sentence is successful, his friends and family deny he was leading a playboy lifestyle overseas.
Priscila has also spoken out, saying that she and Toby had been together for five years and she thought that they were going to get married.
“We used to live in Spain and moved here together a year ago. obviously I am no longer with him now but he is still a friend.”
Toby’s mother Beverley Carroll, who lives in Paeroa, is upset her son is being forced to spend more time in jail, and earlier this year defended him by saying he wasn’t doing anything that any young man in another country wouldn’t do.
“He has slept with a girl. It was sex outside of marriage and there is no other country where that is a crime. I’m extremely proud of my son. In my eyes he hasn’t done anything wrong.”
