Farmer jailed three years for defiling eight-year-old girl

A farmer was found guilty of defiling an eight-year-old girl in Kanga, a neighborhood of Zorko in the Bongo District of the Upper East Region, and was given a three-year jail sentence by a Bolgatanga Circuit Court.

Yaw Apuriyuure Azorkosakiya, 19, was charged with violating Criminal and Other Offenses Act 129 (Act 1960) by defiling a female child under the age of 16.

The defendant accepted culpability and entered a plea of guilty, but he also begged for compassion, saying he had no idea what had driven him to perpetrate the murder.

He entered his own plea, and the court—presided over by Sumaila Mbache Ahmadu—found him guilty and condemned him accordingly.

Although the case involved a serious offense, the court stated that the accused was a juvenile offender who was convicted in accordance with the Juvenile Act, which resulted in the decreased sentence.

The complainant, cloth weaver Anita Lariba Adayikine, shared a home with the victim (a class three student), according to the prosecution, which was led by Inspector Baliki Amidu Issaka.

The accused person went to the victim’s father’s gas station with her brother on September 3, 2023, around 1200 hours, and asked her to purchase him water.

The prosecution said that after consuming the water, he purchased gasoline and asked the victim to accompany him to where his tricycle was packed in order to get the container.

The perpetrator left the fuel in the tricycle’s container when he arrived at the tricycle’s parking spot and rode the victim to a millet farm nearby.

The accused covered the victim’s mouth while they had sex, which caused her to bleed while she screamed for aid.

Following the incident, he threatened to murder the woman if she told anybody what had happened.

However, the complainant spotted the victim walking in an odd way on September 4, 2023, at around 1800 hours. When she reached the victim, she saw that her vagina was swollen, and she described her trauma, naming Azorkosakiya as the culprit.

The accused was challenged by the complainant at his home, and although he initially rejected the charges, he later fled into hiding.

After filing a police complaint, the complainant was given a medical paperwork to take the victim to the hospital for treatment and reporting.

The accused was allegedly apprehended at his hiding place on September 14, 2023, and he confessed to the crime in his caution statement, according to the prosecution.

He did, however, claim that he is unsure of what motivated him to engage in the act..