Man’s jail term for rape slashed from 1,050 years to 42

 

The accused will serve a jail sentence of 42 years but will be whipped a maximum of 24 times allowed under the law.

KLANG: The High Court here has set aside a 1,050-year jail term imposed on a 33-year-old man for raping his underage stepdaughter over a three-year period from 2018.

Judge Azmi Abdullah said the long custodial sentence by a sessions court judge early last year was “illogical and emotional”.

Azmi reduced the jail term to a total of 42 years but maintained the maximum 24 strokes of the rotan allowed under the law.

The judge said he would deliver the grounds of judgment later.

The man, who was unrepresented during his trial, had pleaded guilty to committing the offences at a house in Sungai Way, Petaling, Selangor, from Jan 5, 2018 to Feb 24, 2020.

He sexually assaulted the girl 50 times in 2018, 32 times in 2019, and 23 times in 2020, bringing the total number of charges to 105. The girl was 12 in 2018.

Sessions court judge M Kunasundary had on Jan 27 last year ordered the accused to serve 10 years in jail on each of the 105 charges, with the sentences to run consecutively from the date of his arrest on Jan 20.

She also ordered that he be given 24 strokes of the rotan.

Today, Azmi revised the sentence to 14 years each for the offences, and ordered the sentence to run consecutively for three years, meaning the accused now only had to serve a total of 42 years.

Lawyer KA Ramu and V Vemal Arasan represented the accused, who had appealed against the sentence. He has been serving time at Kajang prison since January last year.

Lawyers interviewed by FMT last year expressed reservation on the punishment, with one describing it as “ridiculous”. - FMT