Welder remanded for defilement

Cape Coast, May 5, GNA - For allegedly defiling a nine year old girl, a 19 year old welder, Daniel Appiah alias 93old man" was on Thursday, remanded in prison custody by a Circuit Court in Cape Coast. Appiah pleaded not guilty to the charge of defilement and would be re-arraigned on Wednesday, May 18.

Prosecuting, Police Inspector Daniel Agbezuhlor told the court that on Friday April 1, the victim who lives with the complainant at Sunkwa near Dominase in the Central Region, left school with one of her friends during break time to buy food within the vicinity. Inspector Agbezuhlor said on their way, the accused who also lives in the same community, spotted them and sent the victims friend to buy groundnut for him. Soon after she left, he allegedly lured the victim into his room, removed her panty, placed her on the floor and had sexual intercourse with her.

Inspector Agbezuhlor said the victim after the act narrated her ordeal to Appiah's mother, Madam Esi Nyankoah and also informed her guardian, the complainant.

Inspector Agbezuhlor said the accused sensing danger left the town to settle at a nearby village, where the assemblyman on hearing the case, engaged the services of some men to apprehend the accused, who was handed over to the Domestic Violence and Victim Support Unit of the Ghana Police Service in Cape Coast. He said a police medical form was given to the complainant to send the victim to the hospital for medical examination. The prosecutor said the report indicated that the hymen of the girl has been broken.

Inspector Agbezuhlor said, Appiah told the police during investigations that he only inserted his finger into the victim's private part. 05 May 11