A 23-year-old girl (name withheld) has experienced one of the worst sexual attacks in Lagos in
recent times.
The incident took place around 10pm on Sunday, August 28 at 106,
Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway, around Pako Bus Stop.
The victim's aunty, a trader in the area, said the young woman had come to her stall around 9pm that day to collect some money.
“I told her to wait so we could pack up
together later in the evening. She did. But around 9.30pm when I was
still not ready, she said she would go home. She had been sick, so, I
thought it was better. Some minutes after 10pm, I packed up and left,”
the woman said.
But to her surprise when she got home, she was told Judith had not been seen since she left for the shop.
The family quickly mounted a search for her in the neighbourhood.
Her two brothers went in search of her on streets in the area and they did find her.
One of her brothers who spoke with our correspondent, explained that when he found the victim, he could not believe his eyes.
“Her slippers were all torn, the dress
she was wearing was heavy with blood. She was unsteady on her feet. She
could hardly stand up,” he said.
A picture of Judith taken soon after she
was found showed the ivory-coloured skirt she was wearing blotted with
large patches of blood behind and in front.
His brother told our correspondent that when he became frantic and started asking what happened to her, she could hardly talk.
“She said some men raped her. Two men
now came out of the front of the house where I found her. One asked me
what I was shouting about. He said, ‘Because she was raped, is that why
you will not let people ‘hear word’? Is she the first person that will
be raped here?’ After all, I gave her Igbo (hemp) and she took it.’
“I was shocked. I could not believe that
he had the confidence to tell me he was even the one who gave her
Indian hemp. My sister said they forced her to take the Indian hemp and
two of them raped her on a chair in front of a shop.”
The victim told her family that the men grabbed her as she crossed the expressway on her way home.
She said when they covered her mouth and
dragged her to house number 106, which faces the expressway, they took
her inside and forced her to take Indian hemp three times before they
raped her.
The two men who allegedly raped her were
later identified as Wasiu and Monaco, the names they are popularly
known by on the street, while the man who boasted of being the one who
gave her the Indian hemp was identified as Olanrewaju Osinubi.
Wasiu and Monaco are currently on the run.
The victim's brother explained that while he
argued with the two men, who initially came out, other men came out of
the house and joined them, threatening that if he did not leave with his
sister, he would be beaten up.
He said, “While we were arguing there, I
luckily saw a patrol van of policemen from the Dopemu Police Division
passing by and I quickly approached them and explained how my sister was
raped.
“The policemen came down from their
vehicle and because the crowd of boys in front of the house were
threatening, one of the policemen cocked his gun and they all fled.
“But, I immediately grabbed the one who
said he gave her Indian hemp to smoke (Osinubi) before he could escape.
The police took him and we all went to the station.”
While at the station, it was learnt that the victim continued to bleed heavily as everywhere she sat was soaked with blood.
The police asked the family to take her to the Mirabel Sexual Assault Referral Centre for treatment that night.
But by the time they got there around 12.30am, the centre was close.
But officials at the Lagos State
University Teaching Hospital, where the centre is located, referred them
to the Ifako General Hospital, where sexual assault cases are also
treated.
After the initial treatment there,
Judith was again referred to the Mirabel Centre the following day where
she was eventually given comprehensive treatment.
It is unclear whether the centre has sent the report of tests conducted on the victim back to the police as is usually the practice.
However, the victim’s family alleged that they became like bystanders as soon as her case got to the police station.
Her brother told our correspondent,
“Before we knew what was happening, a man had come and said he was the
lawyer of the one that was arrested (Osinubi). I was shocked when the
suspect and his lawyer demanded that the case be transferred to the
Isokoko Police Division, Agege, instead. We who were the complainant had
no say in the matter.”
It was learnt that the case was eventually transferred to Isokoko where two policewomen were detached to follow the victim’s family home.
Again, the family said they were shocked
when they got home and the policewomen told The victim to take them to
where the incident occurred.
“She was sleeping when they came. She
was still in a terrible state. The police brought the suspect to our
home and told us to wake her up so that she could take them to where it
happened. It was so ridiculous that they could make her go through that
at that point. I was angry but we eventually agreed,” the victim’s
brother said.
the victim’s aunty, who followed them to the scene of the attack, said they asked the victim to point to where it happened and she did.
“She showed them the place and even the
chair on which she was raped. It was very wet as they had just washed
off all the blood,” the woman said.
However, the family said they were
surprised when the police charged Osinubi to court on Friday, September
2, 2016 for simply obstructing police work.
According to them, the police have not
shown any sympathy for the victim in handling the case and they fear she
might never get any justice.
It is not clear what the police are
doing currently to track down the two suspects on the run as the Lagos
State Police Command spokesperson, Dolapo Badmos, did not pick calls to
her line.
However, an activist, Mrs. Esther Ogwu
of the Esther Child Rights Foundation, whom the family has approached
for help on the matter, said has notified the Sexual Assault department
of the Lagos State Ministry of Justice about the case.
“We expect that an urgent step would now
be taken on this matter. This is not a case that the police should
even think of sweeping under the carpet.
“This case is not just about her, it is
about other young women and girls who are in danger as long as those men
are still on the loose. But I do not think the police have realised how
terrible it must be for the victim that she may not get justice,” she
said.
(PUNCH)
