Holiday romances are the stuff of rom-coms and chick-lit — but not for 18-year-old Marcus Fakana, who is facing a one-year prison sentence for his summer fling.

The construction apprentice from London was on holiday with his family in Dubai in September when he met a fellow British teenager at his hotel, and they began a romantic relationship that became sexual.

The pair planned to continue their budding connection in London. But when the 17-year-old girl returned to the United Kingdom, her mother discovered the relationship and reported Fakana to Dubai police.

The age of consent in the United Arab Emirates – of which Dubai is the biggest city – is 18, making the girl a minor at the time of her relationship with Fakana.

“I did not intend to break the law, I didn’t even know she was one month away from being 18,” says Fakana, adding he didn’t consider age an issue as they were in the same school year.

The teenager says he’s sorry and regretful for breaking law — but is appealing to the conservative monarchy’s Prime Minister and Dubai ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, to repeal the one-year jail sentence handed down to him last week, “to let me go home for Christmas with my family.”

A ‘modern’ tourist destination

Dubai is popular with Western European travelers, who flock to the beach-side city for its warm climate and luxury lifestyle. The city hosted a record 17.15 million international visitors last year, and its airport served 87 million passengers, making it the second-busiest in the world.

But most travelers are unaware of how different the authoritarian nation’s legal system is, being based on both civil and Sharia law.

Dubai has marketed itself as a “modern and liberal tourist destination,” which can be “confusing for tourists” when they come up against little-known laws or the arbitrary application of them, says Radha Stirling, CEO and founder of Detained in Dubai, a UK-based legal advisory and human rights organization.

As a result, Fakana’s case is just the latest example of a foreigner in trouble in the City of Gold.

Legislation around relationships, alcohol and online activity are some of the issues tourists most commonly run into. While alcohol consumption is legal in licensed venues in Dubai, and party culture is “widespread,” anyone caught with alcohol in their system in a public place can be charged with public drunkenness or consuming alcohol without a license, says Stirling.

“No one would think that it’s illegal to leave a venue, get in a taxi, and go home – but while you’re outside the venue, you’re violating the law,” she adds.

Another area of confusion is the nation’s sweeping cybercrime laws, which cover online activity from hacking and terrorism to unfriendly comments and promoting charities. These laws apply to private and public communications, retroactively and internationally — so something you share online before you travel to the UAE can still lead to prosecution after you arrive, says Stirling.

“I’d say almost 100% of visitors to the UAE are already in violation of those laws, if someone made the effort to report them,” she says. This year, a 39-year-old Irishman was detained in Dubai for three months over sending a “threatening emoji,” and a Northern Irish man was detained for two months over a negative Google review.

‘It can break you’

While the UAE has one of the highest rates of foreign prisoners in the world — not surprising given its population is around 90% non-Emirati — Stirling says most of those detained in the UAE do not end up serving prison time.

The strict application of these laws is necessary to maintain public safety and security, says Azaan Salahuddin, managing partner at Dubai-based law firm Al Adl Legal. “Laws are meant to protect citizens, or people coming in from outside the country,” he says.

He pointed to the nation’s low crime rate: in Dubai, official police figures recorded just 24.6 crimes per 100,000 people in 2023. This is significantly lower than the UK’s rate – measured on a different ratio entirely – of 84 per 1,000 people.

“Every country that I’ve been to enforces their laws,” says Salahuddin, adding that ignorance is not an excuse and it’s each traveler’s responsibility to know the law. In Fakana’s case, “it is clear that the girl was under the age of consent and her parents have cast charges,” he says. “It’s a simple case.”

UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who is also the member of parliament for Fakana’s constituency, Tottenham, echoed these sentiments: “It is the case wherever you are in the world – and that’s why the Foreign Office makes clear on its website what the rules are – that you follow the rules and the law according to that country.”

A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he “recognizes it’s an extremely distressing situation for Marcus and his family,” and that the Foreign Office “is in regular contact with his family and his legal team at this difficult time.”

But other foreigners have also found the UAE’s legal system, and many caveated laws, confusing.

In July this year, Tori Towey, a 28-year-old Irish flight attendant for Dubai-based airline Emirates, was facing six months in prison for attempting suicide and consuming alcohol.

Towey, who lived in Dubai for one year, says her partner became physically abusive after they moved in together. She reported the domestic violence to the police, but her partner made a retaliatory case against her, resulting in a travel ban that prevented her from working or leaving the country.

After attempting to take her own life in May this year, Towey found herself at the police station facing charges of attempted suicide. In the UAE, suicide is illegal, despite a widely publicized announcement in 2020 that it would be decriminalized.

“I had to find out for myself what the charges were, because I wasn’t told,” she says. Finding legal representation was difficult, too. “Lawyers won’t even look at your case without 20,000 dirhams (about $5,400) up front.”

Towey finally got legal advice from Detained in Dubai, and with mounting pressure from the Irish government and the media spotlight on her story, her two-month travel ban was finally lifted, the charges were dropped, and she was able to return home.

Before the incident, Towey says she was happy in Dubai, and still has a lot of love for the city and culture she left behind. “It’s just the system and the stress that it can cause. It can break you, because you can lose everything,” she says.

An uncertain future

Meanwhile, Fakana’s parents had to return to the UK for work, and he remains in Dubai, alone.

“I’ve been here for four months and it’s been stressful and financially draining,” he says. “I’ve been without a family for a long time, suffering anxiety, headaches, and sleepless nights.”

Stirling believes Fakana’s case should have been tried at the court of misdemeanors, alleging that the police incorrectly stated his age as 19 and his nationality as Pakistani in their report, which she says likely led to a harsher judgment.

Fakana and his lawyers are now deciding whether to appeal his one-year sentence in Dubai Central Prison, a jail with a poor record for human rights abuses and torture — although there’s a chance the prosecution will seek an even harsher sentence.

“I heard they could give me a fine and deportation instead and I am pleading for that,” Fakana says.

“It’s been an eye-opener; this has been the most stressful time of my entire life.”