Justice Abiola Soladoye of a Lagos Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Court, yesterday, sentenced a 26-year-old automobile technician (popularly called Rewire), Sunday George, to life imprisonment for sexually defiling his neighbour’s 12-year-old daughter.

  
Justice Soladoye found George guilty and sentenced him accordingly, after careful review of the evidence before the court.
   
The prosecution had told the court that the convict, sometime in 2020, at Mabinuori Street, Ladi Lak area of Bariga, Lagos, did have unlawful sexual intercourse with the 12-year-old.
   
His offence contravened provision of Section 137 of the Criminal Laws of Lagos State, (2015).  He had earlier pleaded not guilty to the charge.
  
During the trial, the prosecution presented two witnesses against the convict, while he testified as a sole witness. However, in her judgment, the judge said the prosecution had sufficiently proved the charge of defilement against the defendant beyond reasonable doubt. She referred to the convict as an irresponsible adult and a pathological liar whose testimony was an afterthought as it lacked credibility.
   
“The court was satisfied with the testimony of the survivor because it was unambiguous. The story as narrated by the survivor was very chilling, cogent, convincing and truthful.
   
“The defendant defiled her by having sex with her in the bathroom and threatened her not to tell anyone .
 
“He had sex with her on several occasions in the bathroom and anytime she goes to watch a movie on the defendant’s phone in his room,” the court held.
   
The judge added: “ Identifications in criminal cases are very germane. The survivor in the case identified the man in the dock as their neighbour, who defiled her severally in the bathroom and his room .
   
“Her testimony was corroborated by the evidence of the Investigative Police Officer (IPO), Inspector Medinat Ganiyu, who investigated this case, and testified that the survivor and her father came to the station to lodge a complaint and upon arrest, the defendant wrote a statement.
   
“Although the defendant denied robbing the survivor’s breast and watching movies with her on his phone in the room, this is an attempt to lie his way out, but he failed because the statement he told the court that he did not make, was tendered as evidence before the court.
 
“The defendant is an irresponsible adult and a shameless pedophile, whose denial of having any sexual relationship with the survivor is an afterthought.” The judge also ordered that the convict’s name be entered in the Sexual Offenders Register maintained by Lagos State government .

She, however, appealed to relevant authorities not to relent in sensitising parents in market places, bus and train terminals, as well as Parent and Teachers Association (PTA) meetings on proper monitoring of their wards as to stop sexual predators from tampering with their innocence.