Nnena
In
yet another case of defilement that seems to be spreading across board
like a wildfire, it was the turn of an eight-year-old girl, identified
simply as Nnena, penultimate weekend when she was violated by a man,
Atipo Larry, whom she described as a customer in her mother’s shop.
As Nnena would tell Saturday PUNCH,
the incident, which happened around Oparo Street in Fagba area of
Lagos, on a Sunday afternoon, shortly after she and mum came back from
church, was not the first time Larry would sleep with her, saying he had
done ‘it’ with her on many occasions but that she was too scared to
tell her mum, identified simply as Janet.
The little girl, whose father is no more,
told our correspondent that Larry, who is said to be an ex-convict,
used to come to buy things from her mum’s shop, which is outside Larry’s
house. She recalled that her mum was not around the first time he did
‘it’ to her.
In
the presence of her mother, who was visibly disturbed by the incident,
Nnena said, “It started one afternoon when my mum was not around. I was
the only one in the shop. When he came out of the house and saw me
sitting in front of the shop, he gave me N50 to help him buy cigarette,
pure water and Tom Tom and asked me to come and give him the items in
his house.
“When I entered the sitting room, he told
me not to tell anyone about what he wanted to do and that if I told
anyone, he would kill me. He carried me and lay me on the floor, removed
my dress and removed his. He lied on top of me and ‘did something.’ I
was feeling pains in my body and I tried to shout but he covered my
mouth.
“When he finished, he picked his cloth
and cleaned the blood on my body and on his own body. He then told me to
go and warned me not to tell anyone about it. I wanted to shout but he
covered my mouth. I left the house crying but there was nobody around.”
Nnena, who seemed not to know what Larry
was doing to her, said she felt serious pain when he penetrated her
private part, saying she kept screaming because of the pain but that
there was no one in the house and then he covered her mouth.
Too scared to ‘die’, she went about her
normal activities and never said a word to her mother. She recalled that
her mother had told her that if she allowed anyone to touch her private
part, she would die, which was to alert her on the need to be
protective, but Larry’s threat seemed to outweigh that. He didn’t stop
there; he did the same thing the following day and allegedly continued
in the act; sending her on errands anytime her mother was not around,
luring her into the house, where he was allegedly squatting and sleeping
with her.
On the day he was caught, she explained
that she was with her mum when Larry signalled to her and told her to
lie to her mum that she was going to use the toilet, which she did.
“When I left where my mum was, he dragged
me into his house, carried me and took me to the back of the chair
(sofa) and did it on the floor. He covered my mouth so I could not
shout. He had just stood up and was about lying on top of me again when
my mum came in. I quickly took my gown and ran away.”
Asked why she had to go back after
repeated assaults, she said she was afraid to die and that she had to
run away so her mum wouldn’t beat her.
Visibly angered by the development, Janet
explained that she was outside her shop washing plates on the Sunday
afternoon when her daughter told her she was going to use the restroom.
“I told her to go and that was not the first time she would go to the
toilet alone.
“I waited for her to return, but she
didn’t. I went to check the toilet, she wasn’t there. Meanwhile, I had
been seeing Larry walking around earlier, so I went inside his house and
saw my daughter on the floor, naked. He was also naked but when he saw
me, he ran away. It took the intervention of neighbours to track him and
we handed him over to the police.
“I have always told him never to come to
my shop again. He owes me some money but I told him to leave it so he
could stop coming to my shop. I didn’t know he was doing such with my
daughter.”
Even though Larry, who is allegedly an
ex-convict, is currently helping the police with investigations at the
State Criminal Investigation Department at Yaba, Nnena is left with some
infections she might have to battle with for some time. “I just want
him to die in prison because of what he did to me,” she said.
The Spokesperson for the Lagos State
Police Command, Mr. Joe Offor, said the case was still under
investigation, adding that the necessary action would be taken as soon
as the investigation was completed.
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