Kehinde Gabriel, 40, a native of Ogun State was paraded before the Lagos State Magistrate’s Court in Ikeja to answer a case of rape involving him and a three-year-old girl said to be the his neighbour’s daughter.

According to the girl’s mother, the incident happened on August 16, 2017, at Onaosa, in the Ibeju-Lekki area of the state, when the girl was going to a mosque with her sisters but was left behind on the way and the suspect who noticed she was alone lured her into his apartment with a loaf of bread and drink and then used the opportunity to rape her.

Recounting the incident, the girls mother said; “She went to the mosque with her other sisters on that day. After some minutes, she returned home with a bottle of drink and bread, crying.

“I asked her what was wrong and she said it was Uncle Kehinde (Gabriel) that gave the items to her. She was running temperature. While her father and I were checking her body, we saw blood in her private parts.

Gabriel however denied defiling the three-year-old when addressing the court saying he found her crying of hunger outside his apartment and gave her food to eat.

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He said, “I saw the girl crying beside my house and I asked what happened to her. She said she was hungry and I gave her bread and beans. I did not defile her.”

The offence, according to Inspector Simeon Imhonwa, the Police Prosecutor was punishable under Section 137 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State 2011.

While in court, the charge against the suspect read thus; “That, you Kehinde Gabriel, on August 16, 2017, on Ogunse Street, Onaosa, Ibeju-Lekki, Lagos, in the Lagos Magisterial District, did unlawfully defile a three-year-old, thereby committing an offence punishable under Section137 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2011.”

Before adjourning the case till October 17, 2017 and directed that the duplicate case file be sent to the Directorate of Public Prosecutions for legal advice, the presiding magistrate, Mrs. B.O. Osunsanmi, granted the accused bail in the sum of N500,000 with “two reputable sureties” each in like sum.

Osunsanmi also added that the sureties must provide evidence of two years tax payments to the Lagos State Government.