A married Sunday school teacher convicted of raping and sexually assaulting his niece over eight years has been jailed for 12 years and seven months.
Records at the High Court in Suva stated the incidents began when the victim was still in kindergarten.
During one incident some time in 2015, the 50-year-old man lay beside his niece while she was sleeping and committed the offence.
The victim, who was then enrolled in a primary school, said the man would touch her whenever he cooked for the village students staying at the school dormitory.
When she was in Class 5 in 2020, the man followed her to the dining hall where he then closed the door and committed the act. On July 16, 2023, he indecently assaulted her while her aunt was opening the store for him to make a purchase.
In her ruling delivered on Friday last week, Justice Siainiu Fa’alogo-Bull said: “Your offending was in gross breach of trust and an abuse of the authority you wielded over her.”
“You started molesting and exposing her to sexual activity when she was just a young child in kindergarten. There is a huge age difference of about 35 years between you.”
The judge also issued a fixed non-parole period of 10 years and seven months and imposed a permanent Domestic Violence Restraining Order on him.
