Koch guilty of sexual exploitation

Despite a sloppy police investigation and wildly inconsistent witness statements, High Court Judge President Petrus Damaseb found there was sufficient proof to convict Bertus Koch (42) of child trafficking and contravening the Combating of Immoral Practices Act for immoral sexual acts with children.

Lack of medical evidence, in addition to contradictory court testimony and statements given to the police in 2016, led Damaseb to acquit Koch on rape charges made by five children, aged between nine and 13, during the time the sexual abuse took place in Swakopmund.

Koch was found guilty on five charges of child trafficking in contravention of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act and the five alternatives to rape counts of contravention of the Combating of Immoral Practices Act by committing or attempting to commit a sexual act with a child below the age of 16.





Delivering his judgement yesterday, Damaseb highlighted that one of the minors, who was 12 between November 2015 and May 2016 when the abuse took place, testified that Koch did not rape her.

Yet in police statements from 2016 she had claimed Koch had raped her at least three times a week during the five months.

Moreover, a medical examination conducted shortly after the allegations came to light found no evidence that the minor had been “exposed to penetrative sex because her hymen was intact.”

Damaseb said while there was sufficient proof that Koch did traffic the children by harbouring them or inviting them into his one-room shack with the intention to commit a sexual or immoral act, there was no further evidence given to show the accused “committed contact sexual acts on the complainants.”

Further, the statements made by the complainants to the police did not match the versions given during the trial, which the judge said were “at best sketchy and so generalised that it would be difficult for an accused even with abundance with resources to offer exculpatory evidence.”

Another issue that compounded the difficulty of the case were a lack of details in regard to dates and times of the offences, which he said made it difficult for Koch to provide alibi evidence.

Damaseb said the various versions made it “most improbable that the rapes could have happened as described”, and added that the different versions “are most confusing even to the seasoned and hardened judicial mind.”

He criticised the police for an investigation which he said “was poorly conducted as no serious attempt was made after the allegations surfaced to try and garner additional evidence that would add greater weight to the complainants' allegations”.



Ring of truth

Still, Damaseb said testimony given by the five minors was sufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Koch had received and harboured them so that he could engage in indecent and immoral conduct when the opportunity presented itself.

Some of the girls testified that on one or more occasions, they were lured to Koch's room with promises of gifts after he had sent them on errands.

Damaseb said there was sufficient evidence to prove that Koch had been, on two occasions, in a state of undress in the presence of at least two of the girls.

According to their testimony, he masturbated in front of them, once while using a condom and another time by wrapping his genitalia “in a plastic bread wrapping.”

Damaseb said this evidence did have “a ring of truth to it” and that it was highly improbable that “the minor complainants could have been coached to provide that sort of detail.”

He said the details of the plastic wrapping and other testimony made it unlikely that the girls had fabricated the evidence, which he said “shines a light on the accused's motive for his association with the complainants.”

JANA-MARI SMITH