An Ikeja Domestic Violence and Sexual Offences Court has sentenced Emeka Orisakwe, a 45-year-old businessman, to life imprisonment for raping his three underaged daughters.
Abiola Soladoye, the presiding judge, on Tuesday, sentenced Orisakwe on each of the three-count charges filed against him.
Orisakwe was arraigned on a three-count charge bordering on sexual assault by penetration.
The daughters were between the ages of four and eight when the incident happened.
Olusola Soneye, the state Deputy Director of the Department of Public Prosecution (DPP), told the court that Orisakwe committed the offences between January and July 2021 at 32, Ganiyat street, Monkey Village, Maza Maza, Lagos.
Soneye said the mother of the children found blood stains on the private part of one of the daughters.
He added that the victim told the mother that her father had touched her buttock.
“Upon further questioning, the mother called the other two children and they also confessed to her that their father had been assaulting them sexually whenever she was not at home,” he said.
In her ruling, Soladoye said the prosecution team proved their case beyond any reasonable doubt, adding that the incident was “most bizarre and unfortunate”.
The presiding judge said the defendant is a “wicked and pathological liar” for claiming that his wife was mentally unstable in order to deny the crime.
The judge criticised the younger sister of the defendant, who testified before the court, for tendering a medical report concerning the mental state of the defendant’s wife, which did not correlate with the timing of the incident.
“The children were very honest. I observed the three children who came to testify. This court could see that their aunt, whom they stayed with after the incident, had been working on their brains to tell lies before this court,” she said.
“The children’s subsequent denial in court after they made statements at Satellite police station that their father messed around their vaginas with his fingers is an afterthought and very unfortunate.
“The children were taken away from the custody of their mother and the sister-in-law painted lies in their minds.
“This court cannot be fooled. The DW1 is a liar and a wicked sister-in-law, whose evidence is self-serving to save her brother from drowning.
“The medical report on the mental state of the defendant’s wife which she tendered before this court was dated February 2, 2023.
“But the sexual incident occurred years back and in desperation, they went to cook up a medical report from Imo state that the defendant’s wife is mentally unstable.”
The judge convicted the defendant and sentenced him to life imprisonment on each of the counts.
However, she held that the sentencing should run concurrently.
The judge also ordered that the convict should have his name registered in the sexual offences register.
