Rotten apples: Girls no longer safe in police cells
Crime scene. Police officers are charged with protecting citizens, but some turn into monsters by defiling girls left in their care.
What you need to know:
- A police officer in Kakamega County is accused of defiling a 16-year-old girl in custody. That he moved the girl from the holding cell to the next and defiled her.
- This is barely five months after another officer violated a girl of the same age in Narok County. He is reported to have removed her from the holding cell, took her to his house and defiled her.
Nation.Africa on Wednesday published a story of a police officer in Kakamega County accused of defiling a 16-year-old girl in custody. That he moved the girl from the holding cell to the next and defiled her.
This is barely five months after another officer violated a girl of the same age in Narok County. He is reported to have removed her from the holding cell, took her to his house and defiled her.
The creepy officers are inhuman. Their actions amount to extreme madness.Why do you abuse minors under your protection, yet you’re charged with the responsibility of keeping them safe until they face the charges for which they have been arrested?
While these are just two cases brought to the public eye, many may be unreported for fear of further victimisation or harm. The Constitution, the Children Act (2022) and the Sexual Offences Act (2006) offer minors absolute protection from any form of harm, especially sexual abuse.
Their acts are totally unacceptable given that the police are the first point of contacts for sexual violence survivors owing to the fact they have to report at a police station or post to receive a Kenya Police Medical Examination P3 Form filled out by a healthcare provider and a police officer as evidence that violence has occurred.
At the core of implementation of the Policare policy, which fronts creation of one-stop centres to alleviate the struggles the survivors go through to access police, medical and psychosocial services, are the police.
While we cannot condemn all the police, the fact that these offences have been committed by police officers in two different counties means there is a problem and it must be addressed now.
Last December during a live show on a local TV station discussing ways to combat gender-based violence, Childline Kenya executive director Martha Sunda said they had established a pattern of child sexual abuse in which previously molested men topped the list of perpetrators.
“What we have established is that many of the perpetrators of violence against children are actually survivors of violence themselves, but their traumatic experiences were not dealt with when they needed to be dealt with,” she said.
“So they have grown with it [and] now [that] they are in a position of authority or responsibility…they don't know how better to treat these children that they are responsible for. So it becomes a vicious cycle.”
Is this the case with the police defiling children in custody? Can the National Police Service take this to account and reconsider regular counselling of its officers?
We cannot live in a country where those entrusted with protection turn into monsters.
