WARNING: Graphic testimony
Johannesburg - “Don’t cry now. We can cry later. Be strong,” Gabriella* told her tearful mother.
As her mother became more emotional, the 17-year-old was calm. Moments before, Judge Louis Vorster had found that Gabriella’s stepfather was guilty of raping her when she was just six years old.
It had taken about five years for Gabriella to admit to her mother that the stepfather had sexually abused her. Criminal charges were instituted in 2009.
Judge Vorster found that between 2005 and 2006, the 41-year-old Durban police officer had molested the child at least four times, and raped her on another occasion while her mother was in hospital.
The judge, providing his ruling in the high court in Palm Ridge on Thursday, said the man, 41, had fabricated his excuse for when he was caught by her mother exposing himself to the child. The stepfather claimed he was drunk and on his way to the bathroom when he accidentally walked into the girl’s bedroom with his penis exposed.
The girl has testified that he approached and asked her for oral sex, while her mother has told the court that she walked into the bedroom and saw his pants down and penis erect.
Judge Vorster said the man’s version was a lie.
He noted that the defence, led by JD Pretorius, had questioned Gabriella’s credibility because of contradictions between her testimony and a six-year-old police statement. “Although she’s 17 now, she testified about matters of when she was a small child, who was traumatised. I would be more surprised if there were no contradictions,” Judge Vorster said.
The judge said he believed Gabriella’s version of events. When she was cross-examined, she remained adamant in her version. He found the man guilty on five counts of indecent assault and one of rape.
In aggravation of sentence, Gabriella and her mother told the court how the rape and sexual molestation had affected them. While the mother had to be institutionalised for depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, Gabriella felt that her childhood had been taken away from her, and that she still had flashbacks about the incidents.
“I would do anything to have a normal childhood… But I remind myself that my current situation is not my final destination,” she told the court.
She said the trauma of the trial was not over, as the man’s brother sitting in the gallery had allegedly tried to threaten her and her mother.
The slight quiver in her voice when reading her victim impact statement was the first time she had come close to tears.
Judge Vorster handed down a 10-year prison sentence for the collective indecent assault charges, but said the man deserved a harsher punishment of 25 years for the rape charge. The sentences are to run concurrently.
Outside the court, Gabriella embraced her tearful mother, telling her that everything was “going to be okay”.
The stepfather sobbed in the dock , hugging the group of relatives who had some to support him. One of them said loudly: “Thank you for being a dad when I didn’t have one.”
Noticing she had been heard by the media, she shouted: “And you can put that in any f***ing paper if you want to.”
Later Gabriella told her mother: “We mustn’t let this destroy our future. (What he did) is a drop in the ocean. Everything starts here.
* Not her real name
The Star