CRIMINAL CASE NO. 195 OF 2011
COURT: Defendant stand up. The defendant has pleaded guilty to two counts of incest before a magistrate. He appears before me now for sentence.
The victim in this case is the defendant’s daughter. At the time of the offence she was approaching 31 but suffered from moderate grade mental retardation and had a mental age of a six to nine year old.
Her father, on the other hand, was 55. Count 1 and Count 2 occurred on the same night. The defendant’s wife was hospitalised. After dinner he took the victim into the shower and had sex with her without a condom. That is Count 1.
During the commission of that offence the victim complained of pain. The defendant therefore went out, took the trouble of going to a nearby town, brought back a tube of lubricant and resumed sexual intercourse, again without a condom, that is Count 2.
These were full acts of sexual intercourse, at least on the second time around. Tear and patchy abrasions were found on the victim’s private parts that could have been caused by penile penetration.
These acts of sexual intercourse were also almost certainly non consensual. For early next morning the victim was already complaining tearfully to her tutor that her father had molested her. In one of her subsequent interviews with a psychologist she had also expressed much anger to him and the wish that he would be put away for a longer period.
The saving grace is that notwithstanding her negative feelings about, even fear of her father, and the case the victim’s adjustment after the incident is, I quote, “adequate and fair.”
She is able to resume her normal daily functioning with no significant emotional or behavioural disturbances. No undue anxiety and inappropriate fear or distress is noted. The need for psychological intervention is not indicated.
As mentioned, the defendant was aged 55, now 56. Born locally he was educated up to Primary 6 level. Ever since then he had been a worker in the food and drink industry. He married in 1978 and the victim is his only child. He has no previous conviction.
In mitigation it was said that the relationship between the defendant and his daughter was, before the offence, at least passable and that although the defendant had a cordial relationship with his wife they had not had physical intimacy for years.
So in a moment of weakness he gave in to a sexual impulse, heightened by his use of pornography immediately before the offence.
I accept this is a one-off incident but incest by a father in circumstances that come close to rape remains a very serious offence. Moreover, the victim had the mental age of just a six to nine year old which no doubt was what prompted the defendant to think she was easy prey.
I am also disturbed by how determined, if that’s the right word, the defendant was on completing what he was doing to a daughter. The trouble he took to secure lubricant for the purpose is most telling, but not for a condom, which is another aggravating factor.
In all the circumstances I believe a starting point of 7 years for each of the two counts is appropriate. Given the guilty pleas that will be lowered by one-third to 4 years and 8 months.
Regarding the overall sentence, given the clear break between the two incidents I do not think there is ground for ordering two completely concurrent terms of imprisonment. Instead of restraining himself the defendant was bent on what he started off doing and made extra effort to ensure that it was effectively finished.
I therefore order a partly consecutive period of four months between the sentences, thus giving a total of 5 years.