The Nigerian police force, Lagos command have arraigned a 25-year-old painter, Hamzat Afeez, for allegedly defiling a three-year-old girl in the Egbeda area of Lagos State. PUNCH Metro reports:
He was arraigned on one count of r*pe at the Ebute Meta Chief Magistrate’s Court. PUNCH Metro had reported how Afeez allegedly took the victim’s younger sister into his room while their mother washed clothes in the house. The victim was said to have followed Afeez into his room in a bid to play with her sister.
Our correspondent was told that the suspect defiled her. She was said to have narrated the incident to her parents, who alerted policemen from the Gowon Estate Police Station. PUNCH Metro reported that the suspect, in an attempt to cover up the case, offered to compensate the victim’s family with N100, 000 as payment for her medical bills.
He was said to have been subsequently granted bail by the police. After our correspondent reported the incident, the Lagos State Government and a non-governmental organisation, Project Alert on Violence Against Women, intervened and the suspect was re-arrested.
He was arraigned on one count of r*pe. The charge reads, “That you, Hamzat Afeez aka AZ, on December 13, 2014, at about 2.45pm at Remi Ogunjimi Street, Egbeda, Lagos, in the Lagos Magisterial District, did have s*xual intercourse with a minor, three-year-old, and thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 137 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, Nigeria, 2011.”