KUCHING: A father has been sentenced to 45 years in prison and 36 strokes of the cane by the Sessions Court here on Friday (Jan 12).
The verdict comes after he was found guilty of raping his 16-year-old daughter, leading to her pregnancy four years ago.
Judge Iris Awen Jon pronounced the 51-year-old guilty on three charges under Section 376(3) of the Penal Code, read together with Section 16 (1) of the Sexual Offenses Against Children Act 2017, at the conclusion of the court proceedings today.
If found guilty, the offender can face imprisonment for not less than eight years and not more than 30 years, along with caning of not less than 10 strokes.
For the first and second charges, the offender received a sentence of 20 years in prison and 12 strokes of the cane, with the judge ordering the punishments to run effective from today.
As for the third charge, the court sentenced the man to 25 years in prison and 12 strokes of the cane, with the order for the sentence to be served after completing the first and second charges.
According to the facts presented in court, the victim, who was 16 years old at the time, was subjected to rape by her father in March 2020, April 2020, and May 2020 in a longhouse in Simunjan.
The victim, fearing her father’s temper and frequent scolding, remained silent about the incidents, not informing her mother or other family members.
The victim eventually reported the repeated rapes to the police on Sept 26, 2020, after her father would assault her in the absence of her mother and siblings at home. It was only later that she discovered her pregnancy through a test.
The police arrested the father on Sept 27, 2020, and a chemist report on Jan 13, 2021, confirmed the offender as the biological father of the baby boy born to the victim.
During the court proceedings, a total of eight witnesses testified, including the victim herself, several doctors, the victim’s mother, and the police.
Deputy public prosecutor Mohamad Aiman Mutallib Mohamad Shariff handled the prosecution while the accused did not have legal representation.
