Absent Sophia youth gets life sentence for raping five-year-old
An absent Alex Garraway, called ‘Uncle Alex,’ the Sophia youth who was convicted of raping a five-year-old girl back in 2018, was yesterday given a life sentence for the crime.
Justice Brassington Reynolds, who presided over the in-camera trial of Garraway, 22, of 1162 Cummings Park, ‘E’ Field, Sophia, at the High Court in Georgetown, had deferred sentencing of the former miner to facilitate the presentation of a probation report.
On May 27, he was found guilty of rape of a child under 16 years and engaging in sexual activity with the child. The charge stated that he sexually penetrated the child between November 1st, 2018 and April 30th, 2019, and then performed the sexual act of touching and placing his penis on her buttocks, sometime during the same period.
An arrest warrant had been issued for Garraway when the verdict was announced because he had not attended court and that there was no word of his whereabouts, even though the court had made efforts to contact him. Again yesterday, the man was not in attendance.
The Probation and Social Services Officer, Remesia Lewis, told the court that the man’s mother was contacted for the probation report to be compiled after the man’s whereabouts became unknown. In Lewis’ report, she said that members of
the community had described the offender as a good youth and expressed shocked at the charges levelled against him. She said that his mother informed that Garraway has had no criminal interactions prior to the charge and he occasionally drinks. He also smokes cigarettes and marijuana. The Probation Officer said that the mother has shared that she wants Garraway to be dealt with because a strong message must be sent out.
Describing the offence as being done in a “violent, barbaric manner,” Justice Reynolds said that the Court must send a strong message of deterrence. He said that the child will no longer feel safe and he commended her bravery to speak up about what happened. The defence attorney Ravindra Mohabir, in a plea of mitigation, said there is hope of rehabilitation for his client given his age. He added that he was of the view that with professional help Garraway could make meaningful contributions to society if reintegrated. However, the judge said that young man did not have the courage to face up to his conduct and staying away from court has not helped him in this regard. With that said, Justice Reynolds sentenced the man to life behind bars with eligibility for parole being only after a minimum of 20 years has been served.
The prosecution’s case, led by state counsel Nafeeza Baig, had been that the now seven-year-old had recounted the assault and molestation. Garraway’s defence had been that he was nowhere around at the time the child reported she had been abused and that it therefore could not have been him who molested her. Apart from his defence of alibi, he sought to point a finger at someone else.