By Mohamed Foday Conteh
A Freetown secondary school pupil has been arraigned in court on allegations of penetrating his 12-year-old girl- school mate.
The boy appeared before Justice Mohamed Bawoh at the Sexual Offences Model Court in Freetown on a count charge.
According to the particulars of offence, he was said to have sexually penetrated the alleged victim between 1st March and 31st March this year in Freetown.
The State Prosecutor, Elizabeth Jalloh led in three witnesses who included the girl, her mother and the medical doctor.
The girl as witness told the court how the accused first started chatting her up but reported him to the school Principal. She said the Principal cautioned the boy informing him that she is a child.
She said the accused did not stop his harassing of her, and spoke of how on the 31st March while returning from a birthday party at Chicken Town in Brookfields, Freetown, the accused called her and asked her to meet him at Bus Halt.
The girl said she went as requested by the accused and met him in a shop. She claimed the accused pushed her in, and then shut the door of the shop before he proceeded to remove her pants and sexually penetrated her.
The girl said the accused gave her a white towel which she used to wipe the blood. She also made a harrowing claim of the boy taking out a knife and threatening to kill her if she revealed what had happened between them. She said the accused also forced her to drink some pills.
Cross- examined by Defence Lawyer Harold Momoh, the girl said a party started at 2 pm and ended at 3 pm in the vicinity, and also agreed that the date of incident was not the first time she visited the said shop. She told the court that although people were outside the shop, she and the accused were the only people inside.
The mother of the alleged victim, Mariama Koroma, was the second prosecution witness claimed she only came to know the accused in the course of the incident. The mother said that it was in early June this year that she noticed that her daughter looked pale.
She went on to question her as to who might have tampered with her, but admitted her daughter at first was hesitant to reveal the identity of the accused, but later did.
The mother said she took her daughter to the hospital where she found out from a nurse that her daughter had been penetrated.
The woman said that she later went with her daughter to the Police where they made statements, and were then issued with a medical request form, before going to Rainbow Centre for proper examination.
The third prosecution witness, Dr. Suaad Isha Kamara from Rainbow said findings from the examination of the child revealed her hymen had been ruptured. Also found, was a yellowish scanty vaginal discharge on the girl, which the doctor claimed, occur, where there has been a sexual penetration.
Justice Bawoh adjourned the matter for today Friday 30th October this year with the prosecution set to lead the Police investigator as their next witness and the defence likely to start their case.
Copyright © Politico Online 29/10/21
