SANNIQUELLIE, Nimba County – The Specialized Sexual Offenses Division Court of the Eighth Judiciary Circuit Court in Sanniquellie, Nimba County, has sentenced 53-year-old Magistrate Chester S. Paye to a 25-year jail sentence.
By Franklin Doloquee/Nimba County
The Zuolay Magisterial Court Magistrate, Chester S. Paye, was accused of raping a 12-year-old girl who was a caregiver for him.
The incident occurred in August 2023 at his residence in Zuolay Town, District 9, on the Saclepea-Tappita Highway in Nimba County.
The Resident Judge of the Specialized Sexual Offenses Court at the Eighth Judiciary Circuit Court in Sanniquellie, Judge Musa S. Sidibey, on early Monday brought down a guilty verdict and sentenced Zuolay Magisterial Court Magistrate Chester S. Paye to a 25-year jail sentence.
The convicted magistrate, Chester S. Paye, is expected to spend his 25 years imprisonment in Zedru, Grand Gedeh County. He received his guilty verdict during the final ruling, but his lawyer filed an appeal to the higher court.
The court, at the same time, denied the motion for a new trial filed by the defense lawyer.
It can be recalled that on Wednesday, March 6, 2024, eleven out of twelve jurors returned a majority guilty verdict against Chester S. Paye, 53, for raping a 12-year-old girl.
Eleven of the jurors voted for a guilty verdict, while one juror abstained without indicating a guilty or not guilty verdict on the delivered verdict.
On Monday, March 18, 2024, the specialized court for the trial of atrocities against women, girls, and children convicted the former magistrate for raping a 12-year-old minor who had been living with him and his wife, Rita Dahn (victim’s aunt), on the farm in Zuolay Town, Tappita City, Lower Nimba County, since May 2023.
The court ruling indicates further that Chester S. Paye was found guilty based on facts, evidence adduced during the trial, arguments of both prosecution and defense counsels, and legal citations in its judgment.
Residents of Nimba County who spoke to our Nimba County correspondent referred to Judge Musa S. Sidibey as a man who has come to rescue Liberians through the justice system in the country.
In his ruling, Judge Musa S. Sidibey said the court notes that throughout the trial proceedings, the defendant did not show remorse even after the jury returned a majority verdict of guilty against him.
The resident Judge Musa S. Sidibey of the Specialized Sexual Offenses Court at the Eighth Judiciary Circuit Court in Sanniquellie considered the convict of 53 years old, purported to be a former judicial magistrate with no known criminal record. As such, the ruling and sentence imposed by the court take into consideration the utility of punishment, that is, deterrence, correction, and rehabilitation.
“The specialized Sexual Offenses Court’s ruling also looks at punishment that provides safe environments for children and to deter others with evil intent from posing danger to children and women as well as other vulnerable groups living within the borders of the Republic of Liberia,” he added.
The 53-year-old Magistrate Chester S. Paye’s commission of the crime of Statutory Rape is graded a felony of the first degree, which carries a maximum term of life imprisonment backed by the Penal Law Revised Code: 26:14.70(4)(a).
Our Nimba County correspondent has learned that the court judgment on Monday adjudged the former magistrate guilty and sentenced him to a prison term of twenty-five (25) years, including time already served while in pre-trial detention, and the remaining term be served at the Palace of Corrections located in the 7th Judicial Circuit for Grand Gedeh County with no possibility of parole.
Convict Chester S. Paye, ex-magistrate of Zuolay Magisterial Court, was arrested and indicted by the Grand Jury of Nimba County sitting in its November 2023 Term of Court.
The Sexual Offenses Division Court’s final judgment found Chester S. Paye guilty of the crime of statutory rape, which the prosecution accused him of.
The prosecution’s case was that the retired magistrate, with criminal intention, took advantage of the minor on his farm and sexually abused her, threatening not to give her food if she disclosed his atrocity to anyone.
The case, however, created quite an outbreak as a result of the victim’s narrative to her father, Obrasco Kartoe, and the police, which led the police on a wild goose chase before the accused was apprehended in November 2023.
The victim told her father how she had been sexually abused by Chester S. Paye on several occasions. She stated how each time her aunt, Rita Dahn, was out of the home, the convict would force her to have sex, which continued six times.
The court’s final ruling, meanwhile, corroborated with the jury’s majority verdict, adjudging the 53-year-old man, convicting him for the atrocity committed against the minor girl in violation of Section 14.70 of the Statutory Laws of the Criminal Procedure Law of the Republic of Liberia.
Our Nimba County correspondent said, a few months ago, over 30 rapists were released from the Sanniquellie Center prison after allegedly using Cash Violence by providing some Cash to the various Court workers, including Judge and public Defenders, and County Attorney who was assigned at the Specialized Sexual Offenses Court, but they are no longer available at the Court.
Some of the rapists who spoke to our Nimba County correspondent following their release alleged using Cash violence to get out of the Prison compound in Sanniquellie.
Our Nimba County correspondent, following the case, lamented that in his ruling, Judge Musa S. Sidibey, meanwhile, denied defense counsel nine counts motion for a new trial in the case where jurors found the retired magistrate guilty of statutory rape.
Judge Sidibey denied the defense motion for a new trial after hearing arguments pro et con from both parties. The judge ruled that the size of the judgment was appropriate and in line with legal standards and the criminal procedure laws of Liberia.
But responding to both rulings on motion for a new trial and final judgment, Defense Counsel, Cllr. Allen F. Gweh, took exception to the rulings of the court and announced an appeal to the high court, the Supreme Court of Liberia, sitting in its March Term 2024, in an effort to take advantage of the law controlling the statute.