Court frees men on sex charges

By CLIFFORD FAIPARIK
THE Vanimo District Court has struck out rape and other sex cases against a teacher and two soldiers due to the poor handling of the cases by police in West Sepik, senior provincial Magistrate Sasa Inkung says.
“The court struck out cases against a teacher who allegedly raped and sexually assaulted four of his students at Hayaukono Primary School in Nuku district due to insufficient evidence and poor preparation of court files,” he told The National yesterday.
“The court also struck out a case against two PNG Defence Force soldiers accused of luring two girls to have sex with them at their military base in Vanimo because police officers didn’t prepare court files in the past three months.”
Inkung said Kenneth Ulei, 33, from Wati village, Nuku district, had been remanded since July at the Vanimo prison on charges of raping and sexually touching girls between 17 and 18 at Hayaukono.
Ulei was accused of sexually touching these girls in the classroom.
He had called each of these girls respectively after all the other students had left for the day.
Then he touched them sexually between June 7 and June 15.
“He also allegedly raped one of these girls. However, the court struck out the rape charges due to insufficient evidence,”Inkung said. “The court also struck out the sexual assault charges because the police investigator compiled all of the information in one file only.
“He should have produced three files for each of the three victims.
“Ulei is now allowed to be released from custody.”
Inkung said the same court struck out a case against soldiers Dunstan Liria, 24, from Pamaya village, Pangia, Southern Highlands and Elijah Komaga,24, from Warakum village, Mt Hagen, Western Highlands for allegedly luring girls to the Vanimo base and having sex with them.
“The court struck out the case because police have not yet prepared their court file in the past three months.
Liria and Komaga have been appearing before the court since July 17.
The court struck out their cases on Monday.