A 23-year-old trader who allegedly impregnated his friend’s 15-year-old daughter has appeared before an Accra Circuit Court charged with defilement.
Michael Dodoo pleaded not guilty.
The court presided over by Mrs Christina Cann has admitted Dodoo to bail in the sum of GHC80,000 with three sureties, two of whom are to be civil or public servants earning not less than GHC3,500.
The matter has been adjourned to March 10 for Case Management Conference.
Prosecuting, Chief Inspector Kofi Atimbire said the complainant was also a trader and father of the victim.
Chief Inspector Atimbire said the accused and the complainant resided at Chorkor, Accra.
According to prosecution, Dodoo was a close friend to the victim and her mother and in August 2021, the accused visited the victim when the mother had gone out.
The prosecution said the accused took advantage of the absence of the victim’s mother and had sex with the victim in her mother’s room in a sofa chair.
It said after the act, the accused proposed to the victim, and they had been lovers.
The prosecution said the accused had repeated the act on four occasions without the mother’s knowledge.
It said in the early part of January, this year, the victim’s mother detected that the victim was pregnant and when quizzed, she informed her mother that it was the accused who had been having sex with her.
When the complainant asked the accused person, he admitted the offence.
The prosecution said the victim’s mother and the accused went to a Diagnostic Centre for a scan and it was made known that the victim was 16 weeks, four days pregnant.
The prosecution said on January 20, this year, the victim bled when she was going to have her bath and was rushed to a hospital, where her fetus was removed.
On January 21, this year, the accused was arrested and in his caution statement, he admitted the offence.
