Durban — Work to complete a forensic social worker’s report in the case of an the rape of a 6-year-old girl allegedly by her father had begun.
On Thursday the 35-year-old man appeared in the Pinetown Magistrate’s Court where State Prosecutor Nomcebo Xulu said that the first session of interviews between the victim and the social worker had already taken place.
“The second session is expected to happen in the first week of April in preparation for a forensic social worker’s report that was to be filed forming part of investigations,” she said.
The case was adjourned to April 24 for further investigations in anticipation of the report being filed.
The man’s Legal Aid defence T Ramkissoon asked that the matter be marked final for an adjournment for purposes of further investigations as “the matter has been on the roll since last year”.
The man who abandoned his bail application has been behind bars at Westville Prison since his arrest by the SAPS last year.
Speaking to the Daily News after the man’s court appearance, the founder of non-governmental organisation Bobbi Bear, Jackie Branfield, said if the accused was indeed proven to be guilty, he needed to have the full might of the law thrown at him.
“He deserves the maximum sentence if found guilty because this little girl’s life has been ripped from her and ruined, this ordeal will remain with her until she is 70. The very person who was supposed to love and protect her has hurt her like this. Cases such as these are disgusting and just dreadful. Grooming a child is against the law in our country but at six years old, they are so easily groomed.”
Bobbi Bear is a rapid response organisation that helps with emergency services for children who fall victim to sexual violence.
Speaking from her experience in dealing with child victims of gender-based violence in KwaZulu-Natal, Branfield said that in such cases children rarely lied.
“Not very often have we found in cases that children lie but there were cases where children lied. In my experience those that have lied have done so not about the abuse but who had done it to them. That has been normal because it’s the grandfather or something like that and the child will lie and blame somebody else in a bid to stop the abuse.”
Branfield, speaking on alleged rape perpetrators needing psychological treatment in an effort to be rehabilitated, said that in all her years working with rape victims and research she had done this was a fruitless exercise.
“There’s no way that this can be done, research shows that if they have been caught once then quite a few children had been raped before he got caught. Research shows that these guys can not rehabilitate. If this accused is proven to have done this beyond a shadow of a doubt, he must be put away forever.”
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