A predator and his accomplice have been jailed for a total of 21 years after raping a 15-year-old schoolgirl who was plied with alcohol and drugs, Daily Mail reports.
Nigerian national Akinsanya, 34, and 29-year-old Raji targeted their victim after buying her drinks at Irish pub Paddy’s Yard in Brixton, south London, on February 8 last year.
They invited the girl and some of her friends back to Raji’s flat to smoke cannabis and dance.
The victim’s friends tried to persuade her to leave with them as they felt uncomfortable but she started blacking out and collapsed, Inner London Crown Court heard.
The defendants then put the girl through a prolonged ordeal, with Raji filming her.
Prosecutor Diana Wilson read to the court the victim’s impact statement, in which she told of now finding it ‘hard to trust people’.
The schoolgirl described her attackers as ‘disgusting’, while also rejecting the offer to watch the footage of what happened because it was ‘too stressful’.
Akinsanya, from South Croydon, denied but was convicted by a jury of rape and has now been jailed for 10 years.
Raji, from Brixton, denied but was convicted of two counts of rape and one of taking an indecent image of a child and was given 11 years behind bars.
The girl said in her statement : ‘I was in year 10 at school when I was raped – my school life was affected a lot. ‘I didn’t want to go to my lessons.
‘I find it hard to trust people. I’m in year 11 now, I still feel like my school life is being affected by the rape.’
The court heard how she has stopped playing football, the only sport she liked, due to a loss of confidence following the attack.
She was asked to watch the video Raji took of her naked but had to stop, saying: ‘I found it too stressful.’
The victim added: ‘The men who did this to me are disgusting – I can’t find the words to describe them. These men must go to prison.’
Ms Wilson said the girl was ‘particularly vulnerable due to her personal circumstances’, adding: ‘She was young and naive and vulnerable and unconscious.
‘We have a sociable, outgoing 15-year-old who’s cut off from friends, cannot leave her house, impacting her schoolwork and feels unable to go to counselling.
‘It may be thought that that’s beyond the normal level of psychological harm.’
Ms Wilson told how both defendants ‘took advantage of an unconscious girl’.
William Pope, defending Raji, asked for his previous good character to be taken into account.
The defence lawyer pointed to Raji’s evidence suggesting the girls the pair met said they were aged over 18, with Mr Pope adding: ‘He thinks he had a one-night stand.’
Judge David Richards said it should have been obvious the girls were underage from their behaviour, saying: ‘The whole tenor of that group is of schoolgirls’.
Defending Akinsanya, Anne Faul described him as ‘a lost soul, somewhat vulnerable’.
She also told the court he was partially paralysed from an attack, meaning prison life was more difficult for him.
Sentencing, Judge Richards said of the victim: ‘She’s lost her self-confidence. She can no longer go out. She will live with this for the rest of her life.’
He told the two culprits: ‘The fact that you two abused her one after the other clearly aggravates the matter. The victim was harmed for a long time.
‘Alcohol was used to render her vulnerable, the effect of the alcohol was exploited by both of you. Whilst incapable, she was raped by both of you.’
Source – BarristerNG.com
(vitalnewsngr.com)
