Botshabelo - A child rapist was sentenced to two terms of life imprisonment in the Botshabelo Regional Court this week after raping two five year old girls in 2013, Free State police said on Thursday.
Neo Petrus Setlai, 21, raped the two girls in May 2013, just six days apart.
“On Thursday, 09 May 2013 at about 14:00 the victim aged five years old was playing with friends when an unknown man took her and promised that he is going to buy chips for her. The man took a five-year-old to a nearby hills in Botshabelo and raped her,” said police spokesperson Maselela Langa.
Six days later he used the same ruse to lure two five-year-old girls to the same hill where he raped one of them. The other girl managed to flee.
“Both case dockets were closed as undetected as the suspect could not be found,” said Langa.
In August of the same year, Setlai lured a boy and girl, both five years old, to a hill in Botshabelo where he forced the boy to have sex with the girl.
“The boy managed to flee and told his family what had happened. The following day, the community in Botshabelo went out to look for a suspect and found him with a used condom after the boy had given the description of the suspect,” Mokatsane said.
“The police were called and they took the suspects’ used condom for DNA test and the results were positive. The suspect was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment for rape.”
It was only after a detective constable attached to the police’s family violence, child protection and sexual offences unit noticed the modus operandi in the three cases were similar that officers tested Setlai’s DNA against the evidence gathered in the two other rape cases.
“Detective Constable Nikiwe Mokatsane of Selosesha SAPS FCS analysed the modus operandi that led to Neo Setlai who was in prison serving 15 years for rape and the DNA tests were done which linked the suspect with the cases reported in May 2013,” Langa said.
African News Agency
*E-mail your opinion to [email protected] and we will consider it for publication or use our Facebook and Twitter pages to comment on our stories. See links below.