Evangelist jailed 7 years for sucking boy’s manhood

A self-acclaimed evangelist and trader who sucked the manhood of a 12-year-old boy to satisfy his libido at Madina, north of Accra, was yesterday convicted and sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment by an Accra Circuit Court.

Benjamin Bandong, 22, was charged with a count of defilement contrary to Section 101 of the criminal Offence Act 29 of Act 1960.

He pleaded guilty to the charge and the presiding judge, Ms Ellen Amoah, sentenced him to seven years in hard labour to serve as a deterrent.

Bandong is said to have just been released from prison about nine months ago on similar offences, but he seems not to have reformed himself and went back to perpetrate the act.

Handing the seven-year jail sentence, the judge said the action of Bandong has brought emotional and psychological effects on the victim, who is just 12 years, and that the sentence would serve as a deterrent to others who think they could perpetrate such crimes and get away.

The judge noted that, in such cases, attention should not only be visited on the accused, but the victim as well, adding that the future of the victim should be of great concern.

The prosecutor, Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), Sarah Acquah, told the court that the complainant is the grandmother of the victim and they live at Ogbojo, near Madina while the convict also lives at Madina Estate in Accra.

She said somewhere in the month of September, last year, the convict met the victim at a Charismatic Worship Centre and introduced himself as an evangelist and expressed the desire to be his (victim) friend and subsequently invited him to his house.

ASP Acquah said in the month of November 2013, the victim visited the convict at his house, but to his surprise the convict forcibly had sexual intercourse with him through his anus and warned him not to disclose his (convict) act to anybody.

She said after the act, the convict visited the victim’s grandmother and introduced himself as an evangelist and a friend to her grandson.

The prosecutor added that, the grandmother unknowing of the convict’s act, received him nicely and granted a permit for her grandson to be visiting him since he (convict) could transform her grandson’s life through the evangelization work.

ASP Acquah further explained that, not satisfied with the act, the convict on December 28, last year, again visited the complainant’s house and met the victim lying on a student’s mattress in a store in front of the house, removed his pants and started sucking his (victim) penis.

She said unluckily for the convict, a witness in the case who went to the store to purchase items caught him in the act and raised alarm, but the convict took to his heels and the victim was later quizzed and he revealed his ordeal to the complainant.

The prosecutor said a report was lodged with the police and a medical form issued to send the victim to a hospital for examination while the police later apprehended the convict at his hideout and charged him with the offence.

However, Bandong who spoke to the court through an interpreter in Ewe before the sentence, admitted the offence and pleaded guilty.

He was whisked away by police at the court in a pickup to begin his jail term at the Nsawam prisons.