A Bolgatanga Circuit Court has sentenced a farmer to three years imprisonment for defiling an eight-year-old girl at Kanga, a suburb of Zorko in the Bongo District of the Upper East Region. 

Yaw Apuriyuure Azorkosakiya, 19 years, was accused of defiling a female child below age 16 contrary to the Criminal and Other Offences Act 129, (Act 1960). 

The accused person admitted the crime and pleaded guilty but asked for mercy, saying he did not know what came over him, which made him commit the crime. 

The court, presided over by Mr Sumaila Mbache Ahmadu, convicted him on his own plea and sentenced him accordingly. 

The court said although the case was a serious offence, the accused person was a young offender and that he was sentenced based on the Juvenile Act, hence the reduced sentence.  

The prosecution, led by Inspector Baliki Amidu Issaka, said the complainant, Anita Lariba Adayikine, a cloth weaver, lived with the victim (a class three pupil) at Kanga, the same community where the accused person lived. 

On September 3, 2023, at about 1200 hours, while the victim was at her father's fuel station with her sibling, the accused person went there and sent her to buy him water to drink. 

After drinking the water, he bought fuel and asked the victim to follow him to where his tricycle was packed in order to collect the container, the prosecution said. 

On reaching where the tricycle was parked, the accused person abandoned the fuel in the container in his tricycle and carried the victim into a nearby millet farm. 

While the victim was crying for help, the accused person covered her mouth and had sexual intercourse with her and she started bleeding.  

After the act, he threatened to kill the victim if she disclosed what happened to anyone. 

However, on September 4, 2023, at about 1800 hours, the complainant saw the victim walking in an unusual manner and she approached her, only to discover that her vagina was swollen, and she narrated her ordeal, mentioning Azorkosakiya as the perpetrator.  

The complainant confronted the accused person in his house, and he denied it but went into hiding after the confrontation.  

The complainant then reported to the police and she was issued with a medical form to take the victim to the hospital for medical attention and report.  

The prosecution said on September 14, 2023, the accused was arrested at his hide-out, and he admitted the offence in his caution statement. 

However, he stated that he did not know what came over him to engage in the act.