A 33-year-old private security man, Steven Newman has been sentenced to twelve years imprisonment after a court in Kumasi found him guilty of defilement.
According to Newman, he was falsely accused by the mother of an eight-year-old girl for sleeping with her daughter. An accusation he described as concocted to extort money from.
The Silver FM security man narrating what led to his unfortunate imprisonment said, the complainant was a guest on one of the radio station’s evening programmes and had been frequenting the premises with her daughter. He said during the 2018 Christmas season when the station was on break, “the woman came around with her daughter for help but at that time it was only the host who was in the studio and the woman requested to see him”.
Newman added, “the little girl left her mother and came to hug me and demanded food because the last time they came I bought rice for her.”
The poor father of one indicated that when he decided to descend the stairs to get the food for the little girl her mother came out of the studio “so I handed over her daughter to her”.
Newman said a week later, the police invited him for questioning, a situation he did not understand but had to honor. He said he was remanded into police custody while the complainant threatened to take the matter to court unless he admits the accusation or compensates her with Ten Thousand Ghana cedis to settle the case out of Court. “I told her I did not do it so there was no way I was going to admit I defiled her daughter.” He said.
Eventually, he said he was dragged to court where the judge remanded him into custody for a week at the Kumasi Central prison after pleading not guilty to the charge of defilement.
Newman said during his trial, the eight-year-old girl contradicted herself when she was called into the witness box. “In one breadth, she said I made her sit on me, and in another breadth she said I laid her down and slept with her. It then occurred to me that she had been coached by her mother on what to say.”
However, he said the Court became convinced that he had committed the act when the complainant brought in a doctor as a witness. “The doctor said he found out that the little girl had been penetrated either by the finger or penis. I remembered the girl said her mother inserted hot pepper into her vagina while threatening her to admit that she had been defiled so I drew the court’s attention to it but it was ignored.” He stated.
Newman, who could not hire the services of a lawyer, was sentenced to twelve years at the Kumasi Central Prison.
Source: crimecheckghana.org
