A police officer allegedly raped a female suspect in an office at Simunye Police Station.
The woman (19) reportedly agreed to sleep with the officer because she had been promised that the charge against her would be dropped, allegedly by Constable Wonder Mabuza (32).
The agreement was made while the woman was under the influence of intoxicating liquor. Sources privy to details of the matter said the woman from Hlane, whose name has been deliberately withheld as she is a survivor of abuse, had been in the holding cells after she was arrested for neglecting her minor child.
She had reportedly abandoned the child while she allegedly went gallivanting at drinking holes at Simunye Plaza. Her arrest happened on Tuesday night.
Sources said the 19-year-old had been in the holding cells with another female suspect. Meanwhile, Mabuza was on night duty together with another officer.
“Being on night duty was sort of a punishment for him as he had behaved unprofessionally prior to this day. During the course of the night, he told his colleague to go and sleep as he would man the police station alone,” alleged a source. While he was alone, the officer allegedly went to the holding cells and called the 19-year-old woman, reportedly under the pretext that he wanted to process her fingerprints.
However, when they were in one of the offices, his tune changed as he allegedly told the suspect that the offence against her was serious.
He then allegedly offered to assist her by dropping the charges so that she could not go to court the next day (Wednesday).
The catch to this offer, sources alleged, was that they should sleep together, to which the woman agreed. It seemed like a done deal until the next day when the woman was taken to court for the same offence she had been promised would be dropped.
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She was remanded into custody. Sources said it was only then that the woman communicated her shock at the fact that she was called to the accused’s dock when she had in fact paid to be freed the next morning.
This allegation raised eyebrows and the police at Simunye Police Station were prompted to investigate the matter.
The woman was reportedly taken to hospital for an examination which, according to sources, indicated that she had had intercourse.
The officer was subsequently arrested and charged with rape on Wednesday.
Well-placed sources said he was on duty when he was arrested. Mabuza of Mafutseni appeared before Principal Magistrate Musa Nxumalo at Simunye Magistrate’s Court yesterday.
He was charged with contravening Section 3(1) of the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Act of 2018, a charge that attracts a custodial sentence without an option of a fine for persons found guilty.
According to the charge sheet, he unlawfully had sexual intercourse with the woman without her consent.
The charge is accompanied with aggravating factors, which include that the accused did not use protection, thus exposing the complainant to the risk of contracting sexually transmitted infections.
During Mabuza’s appearance in court, Senior Crown Counsel Mbutfo Mbingo filed an application to have the accused remanded into custody while the matter was postponed to a later date pending setting of a date of trial. The matter was set to return to court on Thursday.
Eswatini Observer Press Reader
