The Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Court sitting in Ikeja, Lagos State, on Tuesday, sentenced a 50-year-old Islamic cleric, Isa Mustapha, to life imprisonment for defiling his neighbour’s eight-year-old daughter.

Delivering judgement, Justice Ramon Oshodi, held that the prosecution proved its case of defilement against the convict.

The presiding judge said: “In defilement, consent of the survivor is immaterial as a child cannot give consent.

“I believe the evidence of the survivor’s father when he said she was eight years old when the incident happened.

“The prosecution has successfully proved the first ingredient of defilement.

“The survivor, who identified the defendant as ‘Alfa’  who lives downstairs of their house, testified that her mother sent her on an errand to buy pepper in which the defendant told sent her to bring onions for him.

“On her way back to her house, he lured her inside his room.

“The survivor told this court that the defendant slept with her four times and that the defendant lives alone in his apartment.

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“The testimony of the survivor was impeccably clear as there was no inconsistency in her evidence.”

Justice Oshodi added that the defendant’s oral submission, medical report and the investigative police officer corroborated the evidence before the court.

“The defendant’s oral admission that he was at the scene of the incident and that he only fingered the survivor, corroborated the evidence before the court that the defendant was with the survivor at the scene of the incident.

“The defendant is hereby found guilty as charged. He is sentenced to life imprisonment,” the judge held.

Oshodi further ordered that the convict should have his name entered into the register of sexual offenders of Lagos State.

Earlier, the defence counsel, Mrs Morenike Ifarinde, in her allocutus, prayed the court to temper justice with mercy, adding that the defendant was an Islamic cleric and had never been charged with any offence.

“We urge the court to give the defendant minimum sentencing having convicted him,” Ifarinde said.

The state prosecutor team, Mr Babajide Boye and Mr Abiodun Alagbe, however, urged the court to convict the defendant accordingly.

The Star