Justice Abiola Soladoye of a Lagos Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Court yesterday sentenced a 35-year-old music teacher, Anthony Okeh, to life imprisonment for defiling a nine-year-old pupil.

The court found Okeh, a counsellor at Lachez O International School, guilty as charged by the state government and held that the prosecution had successfully discharged the burden of proof in the defilement case.

Delivering the judgment, the trial judge described Okeh as “a pathological liar and a soulless man without any iota of shame.” She stated that a teacher should not be engaging in unlawful sexual intercourse with a pupil.

Justice Soladoye said the case relied on direct evidence, as the survivor testified in court, narrating her ordeal at the hands of her music teacher, whom she described as a sexual predator.

According to the judge, “The evidence of the survivor was lucid, cogent, unequivocal, and compelling, and the denial of the convict did not hold water. To the mind of this court, the denial of the defendant is a form of distancing himself from the crime.

“The defendant is a pathological liar whose evidence is an afterthought, and I do not believe him at all. I do not believe the other three defence witnesses as well because their evidence is devoid of truth, and they are tainted witnesses. Cases are not won on the number of witnesses presented to testify before the court but on the quality of evidence adduced that is credible, convincing, and compelling.”

The judge recounted the survivor’s testimony, in which she narrated how the convict called her upstairs to the music room, showed her nude pictures, claimed to be a cultist, and threatened to kill her if she disclosed the abuse to anyone.

“The survivor recognised the man in the box as her music teacher, who defiled her more than twice in the music room. The testimony of the investigative police officer (IPO) corroborated the survivor’s account when she said her mother noticed her reluctance to go to school. The girl later confessed to her mother what the defendant had been doing to her,” Soladoye said.

The judge noted that the IPO testified that the survivor’s mother reported the case to the police and that the statement of the nominal complainant was admitted into evidence.

The court subsequently convicted the defendant on the one-count charge of defilement and sentenced him to life imprisonment. Justice Soladoye also ordered that the convict’s name be registered in the Lagos State Sexual Offences Register.