A 35-YEAR-OLD Bikita man employed as a domestic worker has been sentenced to 45 years in jail for raping his employer’s 11-year-old daughter three times.
Masvingo regional magistrate Innocent Bepura said the rapist, Tawanda Nhengo, should have acted as the parent of his victim instead of turning against her.
“During the commission of these criminal activities of rape, which these courts take very seriously, the accused breached some trust as he was in loco parentis of the child at the time. The court highlights the seriousness of the offence of rape,” Bepura said.
“There was breach of trust to both the victim, the siblings and the aunt who left the child in the accused’s care and the State had proved its case beyond doubt.”
Nhengo had been charged with four counts of rape, but was convicted of three.
In January, the complainant’s aunt, who stayed with her, left for Gweru, where the victim’s mother was hospitalised.
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On an unknown date that month, Nhengo ordered the complainant’s siblings to go and look for cattle while he remained at home with her.
He then went to bath and when he was naked, he asked the girl to bring him his mobile phone, to which she innocently complied.
He asked her to enter the bathroom and as she was handing him the phone, he grabbed her and pinned her on the floor and raped her once.
He ordered her not to tell anyone.
Nhengo again allegedly raped the girl during the same month when he took advantage that the girl’s siblings had retired to bed and he raped her in his bedroom.
In May, he waylaid her while on her way from school and raped her in the bush.
He again ordered her not to tell anyone.
For each count, Nhengo will serve an effective 15 years.
Liberty Hove prosecuted.