The Abia state police command has pa­raded three suspects, Chima Ochiabuto (35); Immaculate Ogbonnaya (25) and Uche Nwaokoro (20), for allegedly defiling a 12- year old girl.The suspects, according to the police serially had car­nal knowledge of the victim, a Primary four pupil of Aro­chukwu Primary School.

Police said the suspects were arrested by the youths of the community and handed over following an alarm raised by the victim’s guardian.

Corroborating the police account, the elder sister of the victim (names withheld) who stated that the defiled victim lives with her, said that the incident came to the fore when the little girl narrated her ordeal.

The Abriba- born mother of two said the incident took place while the victim went in search of the family’s miss­ing dog at Arochukwu, where they reside.

According to her, when the dog got missing, she and the little girl went in search of the dog in different directions and places but for two days, the child did not return, a de­velopment that threw the fam­ily into panic.

Following her sudden dis­appearance, the search for the missing dog was suspended and turned to a search for the girl who later showed up after two days.

When confronted, she could not offer any convincing explanations on the reason for her long absence, a develop­ment that made the elder sis­ter lose her temper, upbraided her and slightly beat her up.

“When I started beating her, she told me that Chima (one of the alleged rapists) abducted and hid her in his house and had been having illicit carnal knowledge of her for two days. She also in­formed that the other victims had at various times equally had sex with her in turns.

“She further told me that one of the suspects had been telling her to misbehave so that when I beat her she can run away from the house and come to his house so that they can have more excuse to sleep under the pretext that he is protecting her,” she said.

Meanwhile, the victim, now in police custody, nar­rated how the suspects had at various times had sex with her, including how one of them kept her for two days at his residence while she was looking for the missing dog.

Later in an interview, one of the victims, Ochiabuto, a father of three, confessed the girl was a friend of his daugh­ter and had been coming to his house to visit the daughter.

Although he denied hav­ing sex with the victim, he admitted that sometime in August, he attempted to sleep with her when she came over in the night having said the sister chased her away for mis­behaving.

“I have never slept with her but one night when she came to my house in August, I gave her food and allowed her to stay in my house and took her back in the morning. Some other time, she came and I at­tempted to have sex with her but I did not,” he stuttered.

But unlike, Ochiabuto, an­other suspect, Uche, confessed to committing the crime, blaming it on the devil. “She came to my house and the devil tempted me and we slept together,” he confessed.

However, the third sus­pect, Immaculate, denied ever having sex with the victim. He rather explained that one night while he was riding home on his bike around 10 pm, he saw the girl crying at the village square and decided to take her back to the sister.

“I was going home one night with my girlfriend and when I came to the village square, I saw this girl crying and I asked her why, she told me that she lost her Aunty’s N10 change and was beaten by her. I decided to take her to their house with my girlfriend and asked the sister to accept her back and that If she did not accept her, that I would report her for child abuse because it was already late in the night to send a small girl on errand or send her out of the house.

“After that I went home with my girlfriend. I was in the farm few days later when some youths in the village came and asked me to come home and when we got home they handed me over to the police saying I raped some­body. I did not sleep with her,” he insisted.

Meanwhile, police said the suspects would soon be arraigned in court.