Sierra Leone has recorded a huge drop in the number of sexual penetration cases on the record of the new criminal session at the High Court of Freetown.
For the past three years, sexual penetration cases is always topping the list for the most number of cases on the criminal sessions in the Judiciary of Sierra Leone. However, only one case of sexual penetration was on record when a new criminal session opened last week.
The session which was presided over by Justice Alusine Sesay , had a total of 76 cases, with robbery with aggravation and other robbery related offences topping the list with 31 cases.
Over the last two years, there were a lot of sexual related offences being committed against women and girls. And as a result of the increase in such crimes, the government of President Bio decided to pass a State of Emergency on sexual related offences and also established the Sexual Offences Modal Court.
The Sexual offence Modal Court, was established mainly to look into sexual penetration matters, so that the process can be expedited for justice to be delivered at the shortest possible time.
The Court became operational after Law Makers in the country had strengthened the Sexual Penetration Act of 2019, with tougher punishment for perpetrators.
And one of the reasons , judges keep citing for sentencing convicts on certain offences is to serve as a deterrent, so that others will not commit the same crime. And since its establishment, the Sexual Offence Modal Court, has demonstrated such, by sentencing a host of sexual penetration convicts, after thorough trials.
After looking into some of the matters being mentioned yesterday in Court, Justice Sesay later assigned some of those matters to judges for onward proceedings and later adjourned the sessions.