MAN SENTENCED TO TWO LIFE TERMS PLUS 20 YEARS FOR RAPING HIS DAUGHTER AND NIECE
The Mthatha Regional Court sentenced a 41-year-old man to two life imprisonment terms and additional 20 years after convicting him on two counts of rape and two counts of sexual assault. The name of the convicted man is withheld to protect the identities of the victims, his daughter and his sister’s daughter. The crimes were committed on diverse times for several years, but he was indicted on two counts of rape and two counts of sexual assault for which the court sentenced him to life on each count of rape and 20 years on each count of sexual assault.
During year 2013 and 2014, the man stayed in a rented one-room flat in Mandela Park near Mthatha with his wife and daughter, who was nine years then. The family’s sleeping arrangement was that the father and mother slept on the bed, while the girl slept on the floor. When the mother would leave for work in the morning, the unemployed father would invite the girl to his bed and rape her before threatening to kill her and her mother if she told anyone about the rapes.
In 2020, his then 13-year-old niece came to visit. On one night, when the man’s partner had been drinking and had passed out, he went to join the children on the floor and forced them to touch each other’s breasts and touch his private parts. A few days later, he raped the two girls, forcing them to watch while he raped the other. He threatened the niece that he would wipe out their entire family if she told anyone about the rape.
When his daughter matriculated and went to university in 2023, she reported what had been happening to her to her mother, and they immediately left the residence they shared with the man and went into hiding before opening a case with the police. The man kept on calling the mother on the phone enquiring about their where-abouts, and begging her to come back home. She agreed, but returned with police who arrested the father, who was consequently denied bail. During trial, the man claimed that he was being framed by his daughter because he had caught her with a boy. Magistrate Shylock Ndengezi found the man to be a “pathetic witness, who denied knowing everything but his name”. The court agreed with control prosecutor Fumanekile Kandile that the only deserving sentence for the heinous crimes is life imprisonment. The court ordered the 20 years imprisonment terms to run concurrently with the life terms.
Eastern Cape Director of Public Prosecutions Barry Madolo commended the prosecutor and the investigating officer for ensuring that justice is served for the young women who fell prey to someone who was supposed to protect them.
