MONROVIA — The Association of Female Lawyers of Liberia (AFELL) condemns and expresses regrets to the family of the three-year-old girl (name withheld) who was raped by a 17-year-old neighbor in the Soul Clinic Community. AFELL’s delegation, led by the President, Atty. Philomena T. Williams, visited the victim on Saturday, February 26, 2022, at the Hope for Women Hospital.
AFELL is dismayed by the information provided by the grandmother and aunt of the victim that eminent members of the Soul Clinic Community pleaded with her to destroy and conceal evidence and compromise the rape case among the families.
AFELL is warning members of the Soul Clinic Community and/or any other person or persons not to interfere in the investigation and/or intervene to compromise the case. Anyone found interfering or intervening for a compromise of the case will be held for Obstruction of Justice, which is in violation of the relevant provisions of the Penal Law of Liberia. AFELL promises to join the Government and the Private Prosecutrix in investigating and gathering of evidence for prosecution.
It was also observed that the victim was placed in the General Ward of the Clinic with an adult male patient. Efforts to contact the administration to ensure that the child was placed in the pediatric ward was unsuccessful. AFELL calls on the Hope for Women Hospital administration to kindly transfer the child to the appropriate ward of the clinic to preserve her dignity.