Mother insists husband did not rape daughter
THE MOTHER of an eight-year-old girl who was drugged and raped before succumbing to a drug overdose said yesterday that she did not believe her 33-year-old husband, who is the girl’s biological father, would have raped his child despite confessing.
The 31-year-old mother, whose stance is also shared by the victim’s grandmothers, said there was no clear forensic evidence and that he might have been pressured to confess. However, she said, her husband has been under a lot of stress over the past few days.
She added that she believed a 20-year-old neighbour who is being detained in relation to this case was behind the crime, because her daughter had told her this before dying and her four-year-old sibling also said the neighbour had gone into the bedroom.
The father, who allegedly confessed to raping his daughter under the influence of yaba and later tried to take his own life in the detention cell, is recovering at Trang Hospital. Police escorted him to court to seek permission for detention pending investigation.
A source said yesterday that the father recanted his confession on Tuesday night, insisting he did not do it. However, the source said, police are confident about the incriminating evidence and are now waiting for the results of DNA tests, which should be out this week.
Meanwhile, the father of the 20-year-old neighbour said the arrest and confession of the late child’s father was a relief because his son was accused of a crime he did not commit. He said he believed police had sufficient solid evidence to arrest the girl’s father and that there was not enough evidence against his son.
He said he would soon apply for his son’s bail release so he can fight the court battle from outside prison. He insisted that his son was a good, family-loving man who had never been involved in any vices, especially not illicit drugs.
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