Court expresses outrage over handling of case
THE NICOSIA Assizes Court yesterday expressed disgust while acquitting a 36-year-old farmer accused of repeatedly sexually abusing and raping his nieces for eight years because of the lack of corroborating evidence.
The man was arrested in October 2003 after the sisters filed a complaint with the police.
He was charged with 27 counts of indecent assault, corruption of minors, rape, sodomy and abduction.
Twenty-three of the charges related to the youngest of the two girls; the rest concerned her sister.
The problem, from the onset, was that the two girls, now in their twenties, refused to testify before the court and there was no way of forcing them to do so since they live abroad.
On top of that, the complainants wrote to the attorney-general asking him to withdraw the case for “strictly personal and family reasons” and to avoid many other family problems from occurring.
The 27-page court decision contains graphic detail of the events of the case, as they were described by the two girls and the defendant himself.
The youngest of the two girls said the initial abuse began when she was 10-years-old though intercourse took place two years later, when she was in her last year at primary school.
The girl said she never told anyone anything because she was scared.
She spoke out for the first time to her fiancé at the age of 18, and he convinced her to report the case to the police.
The girl said she was convinced after she found out that her uncle did the same things to her sister.
Her sister said she was 16-years-old when he sexually assaulted her the first time.
She too was scared to tell anyone because she thought the defendant would hurt her.
The girl decided to talk after she learned that her sister fell victim to the defendant and that she reported the case to the police just a few days earlier.
The man admitted several of the accusations though in turn he alleged that he had sex with the girl when she was around 15-years-old and not 12.
“I am not the only one to blame; it is their fault too,” the man told police.
He alleged that they teased him and also blamed their mother who called him stupid and impotent because he of his lack of success with women.
In its decision, the court said the complainants’ absence deprived the court of the chance to assess their allegations and reiterated that the reliability of a testimony was tested during cross-examination and evaluated also by the image the court got, regarding the sincerity of a witness, while they testified before it.
“These two very vital elements, on which judgement is based regarding the reliability of a testimony, are missing from the case in hand,” the court said.
“Thus, it is impossible under the circumstances to judge the reliability of what is contained in the complainants’ testimonies,” the decision added.
The court also pointed out the lack of corroborating evidence, which was necessary in relation with offences of such nature.
And corroborating evidence was sought in cases were testimony was judged reliable, something missing from the case at hand.
The court also stressed that conviction could not be based solely on the defendant’s confession.
Apart from corruption of a minor, and only in the case of one of the girls, no other offences could be proven by the confession, the court said.
“It can not be said that the rest are proven, the confession does not substantiate all the (necessary) ingredients.”
And corruption of a minor, despite the clear confession, can not be authenticated in the absence of other testimony, the court said.
“For all the above, and despite the disgust we feel for everything the defendant said in his testimony – confession – that he did to his two nieces, mainly with …(name withheld) the defendant is acquitted of all charges,” the court said.
The case was of particular importance since it was wholly based on the complainant’s testimonies and the defendant’s admission.
If he were convicted it would have been the first conviction on hearsay evidence, which was allowed by the court under the new law on evidence.
