Man sent to prison for raping seven year old girl

A man was ordered to serve seven years jail term after he admitted to raping a seven-year-old girl multiple times in the absence of his wife.

Harry Daniel, from Tanna, is currently serving a term of three years and four months for another rape case involving the victim’s elder sister who was 12 years of age when the incident occurred.

Daniel first admitted to raping the elder sister.

Chief Justice, Vincent Lunabek ruled out an application from the Public Solicitor’s Francis Tasso for the sentences to be concurrent.

“I refuse and reject that submission as nonsense,” he said.

“The sentence of three years and four months was subsequent to the complaints of the elder sister of the victim girl in this case, while this current sentence is in respect to the complaints of the younger sister is seven years old at the time of the offending.

“They were two separate complaints made at the same time to the police.”

The rapist pleaded guilty to one count of sexual intercourse without consent contrary to section 90 and 91 of the Penal Code Act CAP 135.

He also admitted another count of Act of Indecency against section 98A of the Act.

The prosecution stood down with an alternative charge of Unlawful Sexual Intercourse.

He said that the man was 31 at the time of the offending and there was an age disparity of 24 years between them and there was a big breach of trust.

Chief Justice said that the girl suffered from severe anxiety, acute post traumatic stress, impaired relations to self, environment and others that may have long life consequences such as inability to develop positive relation with a partner and become a stable mother.

He said that her teacher said that after the incident, a drop in school results and a massive disengagement in school works has been observed by her teacher and legal guardian.

“This is consistent with reinforcement of the damage done,” he said.

“Her impaired relation to self, environment and others, her permanent insecurity, emotional instability, extreme difficulty to regulate and cope with her negative emotions, lead to frequent uncontrolled and disruptive angry episodes, massive inhibition.”

Chief Justice said that the man lived with the victim and had sexual feeling for her that led him to commit the offence.

He then ordered 10 years as the starting point and reduced to seven years and six months for guilty plea.

After considering the ability of a custom reconciliation, he reduced three months and gave another three months reduction because of the delay of the case since 2014.

The Chief Justice ordered an end sentence of seven years that will be served consecutively at the end of the three years and four months sentence that he is currently serving.