Young gets five years in prison

“It is people like you who are corrupting young girls in society…I’m sending a message out for people to stop messing with young girls. I am not going to tolerate it.”{{more}}

This was the stern warning issued by High Court judge Frederick Bruce-Lyle as he sentenced Annel Young to five years imprisonment on Wednesday, June 29, at the High Court’s Criminal Assizes.

After an hour and 30 minutes of deliberations, a nine-member jury found Young guilty on a charge of Abduction, Indecent Assault and Assault. They were, however, deadlocked on an ‘assault, causing bodily harm’ charge.

The prosecution had withdrawn an attempted rape charge against the Calder Ridge resident.

When the teenager took the witness dock on Monday, June 27, she testified that on March 3, 2010, she left her home at about 6:45 a.m. to go to school. The girl, who was 13 at the time of the incident, said while walking, she saw Young sitting in the porch of a house.

She said Young came out onto the main road, stopped her and told her that he heard she has AIDS. “I ask him if he hear is me alone have AIDS in the area?” the 14-year-old said.

She added that Young held onto her hands and pulled her inside of the house. “I was fighting with him because I did not want to go into the house,” she testified.

The girl told the court that she was carried to a bedroom and was told by Young that he wanted “some sex”. “I told him if he do me anything I going to talk,” she said.

She said he then slapped her.

The girl mentioned that Young left the bedroom and came back with a knife and a piece of tissue. She further said that he came on the bed and was forcing himself on her. “…I told him I wanted to get my education…,” she said.

She told the court that she was choked and when he came with the knife, she said she thought Young was going to cut her, so she raised her hand and sustained a cut on her right hand.

While wrestling with him, the girl said Young pushed his hand up her skirt and inserted his finger into her vagina. She then said he took out his penis and masturbated in front of her and used the tissue to clean himself after he was finished.

When she arrived at school, she told the counsellor there what had happened to her.

Conducting his own defense, Young said he was at home that day taking a shower when a friend called out to him and told him his family was downstairs.

“I tell him to tell them hold on…when I come downstairs I thought it was my niece,” he said. However, it was the girl, he said.

Young said the girl confronted him about something he allegedly said about her, but he denied ever saying anything about the girl.

He said the friend called him to the kitchen and he left the girl in the living room. Young said he took a knife and was peeling an orange in the sink.

He added that he went into the living room with the orange and knife in his hands. “I ask her if she want half, but she throw up her hands and said ‘No! I don’t want anything from you’”

Young said he slapped her.

He said she began crying and went into the kitchen for some tissue to wipe her face.

He told the court he told the girl that his niece was coming up the road and that she (the girl) should go to school.

He said the girl went into the kitchen and when she came out, he asked her what happened. “She tell me I ain’t suppose to know that and then she ask if my friend girlfriend have any pad inside,” he testified.

Young mentioned that he called out to his friend’s girlfriend to give the girl a pad, which she did.

He said the girl then left for school.

Bruce-Lyle told Young that he wasted the court’s time by being “wrong and strong”. “If you had pleaded guilty, I would have exercised some leniency on you,” Bruce-Lyle said.(KW)