2nd sex assault case at school
November 22, 2006
For the second time in under two months, the Centre for Investigation of Sexual Offences and Child Abuse (CISOCA) is probing a sexual assault case involving students of Dunrobin Primary School in St Andrew.
According to the investigating officer, Corporal Janet Gowdie, five boys between the ages of nine and 11 allegedly sexually assaulted a nine-year-old girl the second day of the new school term on September 5, after one of the boys lured her off the school compound, during school hours, to a house where four others waited.
But the case was not brought to CISOCA's attention until about two months later on October 30. This was about three weeks after the centre had opened investigations into a report that five boys, four of them nine years old and one 11, allegedly sexually assaulted a seven-year-old girl at the school on September 28.
That case was reported more than a week after the incident.
All nine boys in the second case appeared before the Family Court last Friday where they and the complainant were found, under the Child Care and Protection Act, to be in need of care and protection, and social inquiry reports commissioned for them.
Under Section eight of the act, a child in need of care and protection is one who, among other things, is "falling into bad association, exposed to moral danger or beyond control"....
Author: Observer Reporter
Source: Jamaica Observer
