Jonas Murao denies baby-rape charge with farm alibi as Hardap trial continues

A Hardap region resident accused of raping a four-month-old baby says he was not at the scene where the alleged sexual assault over which he is charged took place.

On 12 November 2016, when the baby was allegedly raped at Hoachanas in the Hardap region, Jonas Murao (46) was at a farm, defence lawyer Peru Liebenberg told the baby’s mother during her testimony in Murao’s trial in the Windhoek High Court yesterday.

Liebenberg also told the witness that according to Murao he returned from the farm to Hoachanas the next day.

The witness responded that Murao was socialising with people at her house at Hoachanas during the evening of 12 November 2016.

The witness, whose name is being withheld to protect the identity of her daughter, said she was woken up by her partner, the father of their daughter, during the night, and he asked her to check on their baby, who was crying.

The witness said she wanted to check the baby’s nappy, but noticed that her daughter did not have the nappy on that she had put on before they went to sleep the previous evening.

She also saw some blood on the baby’s private parts, the witness said.

She further testified that her baby was taken to Mariental to be seen by a doctor and was then taken to Windhoek, where she was admitted to a hospital for treatment for a week.

After she had been woken up because of her baby’s crying, she noticed shoe prints on the ground floor of her one-room house, she testified as well. Those prints were similar to prints made by sandals that Murao was wearing on the day in question, she added.

However, according to the witness Murao had been walking around on the premises when he visited people there the previous evening, and that could explain the presence of the shoe prints, Liebenberg said.

Murao is being prosecuted on two counts of rape, two charges of housebreaking and rape, a count of housebreaking and attempted rape, a charge of abduction and three counts of housebreaking and theft.

He denied guilt on all of the charges when his trial started before judge Claudia Claasen in June last year.

The charges against Murao emanate from events that allegedly took place at Hoachanas in November 2008, February 2012, May 2016 and November 2016.

The state is alleging that Murao broke into a shop at Hoachanas three times, on 19, 20 and 22 November 2008, and stole alcohol, cigarettes and money.

Murao is also accused of breaking into a house at Hoachanas on 3 February 2012 and committing a sexual act with a sleeping woman. He is charged with housebreaking and rape in connection with that incident.

A similar incident is alleged to have taken place on 14 May 2016, when Murao allegedly again broke into a house at Hoachanas and attempted to commit a sexual act with a sleeping woman.

The state is further alleging that Murao raped a sleeping woman at Hoachanas on 12 November 2016.

On the same day, Murao allegedly also broke into a house at the settlement, carried off a four-month-old baby girl and raped the baby.

Murao is charged with housebreaking and rape, abduction, alternatively kidnapping, and rape in connection with that alleged incident.

The baby’s mother also told the court yesterday that in her view her daughter had been taken from her house and raped outside.

She would have woken up earlier from the baby’s crying if she had been raped inside the house, she said.

Deputy prosecutor general Dominic Lisulo closed the state’s case against Murao after the testimony of the baby’s mother.

The trial is continuing.

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