A Pharmacist, Patrick Afun, who allegedly sedated his fiancée’s elder sister and had sex with her while she was unconscious, was arraigned before a Ho High Court on Tuesday (December 13) and charged with rape.
His plea was not taken.
Mr Afun, who was not represented by a counsel, told the court presided over by Justice George Buadi that he was unable to engage the services of a counsel because he was now unemployed.
When the case was called, Mr Afun was fidgeting with his mobile phone in the dock and was reminded by the court of the seriousness of the offence for which he was standing trial and warned to desist from that misconduct.
The accused explained that he was trying to switch off the phone but the court rejected that explanation by Afun as unacceptable.
The court also reminded him that he faced between five and 25 years behind bars if found guilty of the offence.
Mr Afun, who was then working at the St Anthony’s Hospital at Dzodze, was said to have injected the victim with a combination of a sedative and another medication for the treatment of a vaginal infection.
That was said to have rendered the complainant weak, dizzy and almost lifeless before the accused took her clothes off her and had sex with her.
The incident was alleged to have taken place in the evening of March 22, 2019 at the official residence of the pharmacist at the hospital after they both had dinner prepared by the victim.
Awake naked
The victim is said to have woken up naked and confused on the bed because the accused injected her earlier in the sofa in the living room, and therefore asked the accused what had happened whereupon he answered, “We had sex.”
The victim then got up but fell down before struggling to get up again.
She then asked where her clothes were but the accused refused to give them to her.
She then picked new set of clothes from her bag and staggered onto the compound of the hospital, only to fall down again while calling a friend who was a worker at the hospital to come to her aid.
The friend was joined by a security man at the hospital, and they both aided the victim back onto her feet, before she was admitted to the ward.
After the victim was treated and discharged, she went to the police station to report the matter.
That led to the arrest of the accused who only admitted lacing the medication for the infection with a sedative, saying that was only to reduce the pain from the injection.
The prosecution said although the pharmacist denied having sex with the victim, a medical examination on her revealed otherwise.
The prosecution said the victim was a pharmacy assistant trainee on internship at the hospital under the supervision of the accused at the time.
“So, she was staying with her would-be brother-in-law and only left for Aflao on Fridays to spend the weekend there with her family.”
According to the prosecution, the accused earlier injected the victim with the first dose of Ceftriaxone for the infection, without any complication.
Second dose
As the victim was sleeping on the sofa, the accused woke her up and asked her to come over to the bedroom for the second dose which he had laced with the sedative without her knowledge, the prosecution added.
It was on his bed that he raped the woman, the court was further told.
The court directed the Legal Aid Commission to provide the accused with counsel and adjourned the case to January 31, next year.