RPAA 0029/14/CS
Page |1
THE SUPREME COURT, HOLDS A PUBLIC HEARING ON CRIMINAL CASE Nº
RPAA 0029/14 / CS ON 29/09/2017, AND DECIDES AS FOLLOWS:
PARTIES:
PUBLIC PROSECUTION
Versus
NGENDAHIMANA Jean Bosco, son of Rwandagara Charles and Nyamvura Thérèse,
born in 1990, in Kinyana Village, Nyagisozi Cell, Kageyo Sector, Gatsibo District,
Eastern Province (appellant).
OFFENCE
Child defilement provided for and punishable by Article 191 of Organic Law n °
01/2012/OL of 02/05/2012 establishing the Penal Code.
I.
FACTS AND PROCEDURE
1. The case began in the Ngoma High Court, where the Public Prosecution
prosecuted NGENDAHIMANA Jean Bosco for sexually abusing a 17-year-old girl
named DUSHIMIMANA Ruth on 18/06/2013, when she was fetching wood in the
forest with her friends; the latter ran away for fear. In case no. RP 0602/13 /
TGI/Ngoma, adjudicated by the Ngoma High Court on 28/11/2013,
NGENDAHIMANA Jean Bosco pleaded not guilty to the crime of child
defilement, but the Court convicted him, and sentenced him to life imprisonment
mainly on the grounds of his plea of guilty to the Judicial Police, where he
explained how he raped her, the statement from the child who was raped, that of
her mother and that of witness NYIRANDIKUBWIMANA Violette.
2. Dissatisfied with the outcome of the case, NGENDAHIMANA Jean Bosco
appealed to the High Court, Rwamagana Chamber, stating that there was no
evidence the Court relied on to convict him. The appellate chamber, in its
judgment RPA 0080/14 / HC / RWG issued on 22/05/2014, ruled that the
appellant’s allegations that his plea of guilty was made under beatings was
unsubstantiated, and that the lack of a medical report does not invalidate other
evidence, and thus upheld the first judgment as the appellant was unable to refute
the evidence relied upon by the Court of First Instance.