An Aba South Senior Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday remanded a 60-year-old pastor, Chukwuemeka Orji at the Correctional Centre over the alleged rape of a minor.
The Assemblies of God Church cleric is facing one count of serially raping a 13-year-old girl who lived with him.
Orji of the Assemblies of God Church, Ukonu Street, off Ngwa Road, Aba, reportedly forced the victim to suck his manhood.
The rape survivor (name withheld) told the court that the defendant had carnal knowledge of her on many occasions.
According to the survivor, Mercy, the wife of Orji confronted him after she got to know about her husband’s act but he denied the allegation.
The suspect was said to have continued raping his victim after he succeeded in convincing his wife.
He reportedly threatened to send the rape survivor back to her parents in the village in Ugwunagbo, should she expose him.
According to the girl, she was scared of informing her parents, also members of the church in anither branch, of the habit of the pastor after he threatened her.
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The teenager further said that on Thursday, June 15, after Orji’s wife had gone to market, he asked her for sex but she refused on the ground that she was menstruating.
Orji, according to the girl, forced her to suck his manhood and when she could not satisfy him, he ordered her to cut the overgrown grass in their compound “as a punishment”.
She described the act as nauseating and said she went to school crying the next day.
“It was while I was crying that my school proprietor inquired to know why I was crying and I told him the truth,” she said.
She said that it was at that point that the police were invited into the matter.
Orji pleaded not guilty after the charge was read to him.
After presenting his own version of the story, the Magistrate, Mrs Jane Young-Daniel, called Orji’s wife on cellphone, asking if she was aware of the allegation against her husband.
It was learnt that Mercy initially denied being aware of the allegation but later admitted that she heard it and confronted her husband who, she said, denied the allegation.
The Police Prosecutor, Mrs Mary Udoji, urged the court not to admit the defendant on bail in order to prevent him from further molesting the girl.
Young-Daniel ordered that the girl be returned to her parents immediately, after she was told that she had since been staying in the custody of the police.
She also ordered that Orji be remanded at the Aba Correctional Centre.
She adjourned the matter to the 6th and 18th of July for hearing.