High Court upholds not guilty verdict in child abuse case

The High Court of the Maldives has upheld the verdict of the Criminal Court in a child abuse case where the Criminal Court found the defendant not guilty of the crimes accused. 

The case involves the alleged sexual abuse of a child by a friend of the child’s mother. It is alleged that the defendant abused the child from eight-years to 14-years of the child’s age. The child’s statements collected for the case states that the defendant abused the child and a sibling during times when they were alone at home. The child had stated that the defendant was aware of the time of the day when the child and the other sibling would be alone at home. 

The defendant had allegedly criticized the behavior of the victim's sister. The child abuse allegations were concocted as revenge against the defendant for the criticism directed towards the alleged victim’s sister and warnings for informing the victim’s mother of the behavior of the victim’s sister. 

The sister of the victim reported the sexual abuse case to the Human Rights Commission in January 2012, which then forwarded the case to the police. The Prosecutor General’s Office lodged the case with the Criminal Court in March 2013 with the charges of sexually abusing a minor. The Criminal Court ruled that the charges could not be proved in September 2019. 

The law for child sex offenders stipulates a list of evidence that can be used to prove such cases. With the presence of at least five of these stipulated evidences, a conviction could be obtained. 

After the Criminal Court verdict, the prosecution appealed the case to the High Court which ruled on the case last Sunday. 

The High Court verdict read that a Supreme Court case previously ruled, had stated that a conviction could be obtained,  instead of the evidence stipulated in the law, by basing the case on the statements of the victim, if the statements of the victim were extraordinarily believable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.

The court is also to take into account possible contradictions in the statements, possible misinformation, and fabrication to pose reasonable doubt since such cases are often decided based only on the statements of the victim. 

The courts are to take into account whether the version of events are similar from every direction, the behavior of the individual(s) alleging the crime, whether there are any other reasons why the victim may make such an allegation. 

The court found that there were contradictions in the version of events provided by the sister of the victim and the victim. There were also doubts about the allegations based on the statements made by the complainants and the responses by the defendant. 

The judge’s bench of the High Court ruling on the matter found that there was no sufficient reason to overrule the lower court’s not guilty verdict in the case.