A 25-year-old man has to wait a week longer to know his fate after being found guilty of sodomising a seven-year-old boy by a Mswambweni law court.
Athumani Juma, who was found guilty of sodomy on October 5, was supposed to be sentenced this Friday.
However, Msambweni law court senior principal magistrate Leah Kabaria had yet to finalise her sentencing and pushed it by a week to next Friday.
Juma is said to have lured the child from a football pitch where he was playing football with his friends to his house in Kwale county, on June 7, 2025.
Juma denied the charge.
Five prosecution witnesses testified against him.
In an unsworn testimony, the then Grade 2 learner, who testified first, told the court while playing football on a Sunday, Juma, whom he had always seen fetching water at a nearby water kiosk, called him.
He told the court he refused to go but Juma picked him anyway, took him to his house with a promise to give him sweets, and sodomised him.
The child told the court Juma did it twice on the same day before threatening him not to tell anyone or he would kill him.
The child, however, told his two brothers, and days later told his mother.
That is when he was taken to hospital and Juma was arrested.
The child did not go to school for a lengthy amount of time because he could not control his bowel movement.
Majaliwa Mohammed Bakari, a fishmonger in Kikoneni and who is related to Juma, testified in court. He said on June 14, 2025, about a week after the incident, one of the many children who had come to his house to watch a movie approached him and told him the minor could not control his bowel movement.
Majaliwa asked the victim if he was in pain. The child told him he was not in pain and narrated to him what Juma had done to him.
Majaliwa told the court he took the victim and went with him straight to Juma, whom he knew as a water vendor, and confronted him about the incident.
Juma denied it but the child was insistent.
Majaliwa said he then took the child to Kikoneni police station and reported the matter before going to the hospital where it was confirmed the child had been defiled.
The third prosecution witness, Abdalla Juma Chano, a community paralegal legal working with Tunawajali Wajane, a community-based organisation, told the court he was watching the news on June 14, 2025, when he heard a commotion outside his house.
He said he found Majaliwa holding the child’s hand confronting Juma.
On assessing the situation, he took the child aside and calmly asked him what had happened.
The child told him what had happened.
Abdalla then returned to the crowd and separated the accused from the mob that had gathered and had started beating him.
Abdalla also said he is related to Juma, and had known him for more than 15 years.
Shabaan Matano Machakure, a clinical officer at the Kikoneni health centre, told the court the child was received at the facility on June 16, 2025, accompanied by two police officers.
Shabaan and nurse Sophia, acting as the chaperone, examined the child and found there was loss of anal sphincter muscle strength.
Police constable William Ng’anga from the Shimoni police station, who was the investigating officer, said Juma was brought to the police station on June 14, 2025, by members of the public, with his hands tied.
It was then alleged Juma had defiled the minor.
Ng’anga told the court he escorted the child and Juma to hospital where it was confirmed the child had been defiled.
However, Juma insisted before the court he was framed up.
In a sworn statement of defense, he claimed the child was beaten so as to accuse him.
He said he was in Makambani one morning getting his bicycle serviced when he was called to deliver water in Kirugu village, where he sold water until evening.
He then passed by his uncle's house to say hello, shortly after which Majaliwa and another man called Salim showed up holding the child’s hand.
He told the court the child at first denied he had been defiled but he was threatened he would be beaten and change his mind, accusing him of defiling him.
Juma said he noticed the child was bleeding from the head and he concluded he had been beaten and that a confession was being forced out of the child to frame him.
He said he had been framed because of other things that had happened earlier.
Senior principal magistrate Leah Kabaria, in her judgment, said the prosecution had proved beyond doubt the child had been defiled.
Kabaria said the child at first only told his two minor brothers because he was afraid if he told an adult, he would be killed, as had been threatened.
“It emerged that it was these two that reported to his uncle that he could not control his stool. That his uncle asked him who hurt him, that he beat him to reveal who harmed him and it was only then that he told,” senior principal magistrate Kabaria said.
She said she read nothing in the child’s testimony to suggest that he had been coached and that his testimony was as clear as the testimony of a child can be.
“Indeed, the child told the court he did not reveal his assailant until he was beaten. I see nothing about it that suggests a frame-up. It in fact cements the child’s testimony that he kept quiet as he was threatened with death,” Kabaria said in her judgment.
“In view of the forgoing, I do find the prosecution has proved their case to the required standard. I hereby convict the accused person of the charge under consideration being defilement,” Kabaria said.
International Justice Mission, that was representing the victim’s family, welcomed the conviction as an important step towards justice for every child.
“Every child deserves to be safe and protected from violence and abuse,” Aggrey Juma, the IJM manager in charge of the Violence Against Women and Children programme, said.
He said the outcome reinforces confidence in the criminal justice system and sends a clear message that those who violate children will be held accountable.
“We hope the sentence reflects the seriousness of this offence and serves as a strong deterrent to others,” Aggrey noted.
