NGOs celebrate minor's rape appeal sentences

After the Rabat Court of Appeal’s much celebrated verdict indicting a minor’s rapists to 40 collective years in prison, the NGO “Touche pas à mon enfant” (TPAME) welcomed the “exemplary sentences” pronounced in appeal.

“We welcomed with serenity and pride the appeal judgment that rectified the precedent of the first instance, and this by increasing the sentences in an exemplary manner, sentences pronounced against the defendants who abused the 12 year old girl who gave birth as a result of these repeated rapes,” said a statement from the TPAME.

“20 years and two 10 years of imprisonment sentences, plus increased compensation, it makes us feel that our justice system is still present and still playing its role as a protective shield for our children.”

The NGO expressed hope that “these increased verdicts will be enough of a deterrent for the predators who are always watching our little ones.”

While congratulating “all civil society, as well as parents and media who supported the cause of this girl through a magnificent outcry in order to reach this verdict which, if not to heal the subsequent suffering, could at least mitigate the pain of the girl and her family,” TPAME noted that “the fight is still very long to repair the damage resulting on her physical and psychological state following the tragedy of which this defenseless little girl was a victim.”

TPAME insists on “the obligation and duty of justice in the proceedings to prove the parentage of the newborn in accordance with the court decision, based on the expertise in DNA.”

“The family court has the duty to take over this case so that the baby can enjoy all his civil and social rights like all other children in Morocco, and without discrimination,” it believes.

Finally, the NGO insisted on the need for the legislator “to modify the penal provisions concerning aggression against children, in particular sexual aggression, by maintaining the minimum sentence at twenty years of imprisonment.