In a deeply disturbing case, a young man was jailed for 20 years earlier today after Francistown Magistrates Court found him guilty of raping his own mother at knifepoint.
The 30-year-old Tonota native, who cannot be named to protect his mum’s identity, is said to have carried out the cruel act at Gobosholo lands on 8 January 2024 shortly after visiting a traditional doctor.
Court heard how the agitated youth arrived in the night and immediately confronted his biological mum, wielding a knife and ordering the 54-year-old to undress, threatening to kill her if she refused.
Stunned, she asked her child if he really intended to rape his own mother.
When he did not back down, she begged him to at least use a condom, directing him to her bag where she kept some.
After satisfying his strange, twisted urges, the man stayed in the house while his mother, who was cut on the finger by her son’s knife, stumbled outside, reporting what had happened to a relative.
The shocked family member then called the suspect’s sibling, who immediately contacted the police; the accused was arrested the next morning and has been behind bars ever since.
During cross examination, he maintained the ‘sex’ was consensual and also claimed this was not the first time he had slept with his mother.
Having initially pleaded not-guilty, during trial he changed his plea to guilty before experiencing another change of heart and protesting his innocence once again.
Unconvinced, Magistrate Tshepo Magetse noted the accused knew exactly what he was doing.
“He did not act under compulsion, diminished capacity or provocation. Nor was the offence committed under circumstances of desperation or extreme emotional disturbance. It was an act of conscious cruelty and must be met with full force of justice,” ruled Magetse.
“This court takes a firm stance not only to punish but to protect, to affirm the sanctity of the maternal bond and to send a clear and unambiguous message that such acts will be met with full measure of justice,” continued the Magistrate before sending the incestuous rapist to jail.
With his sentence backdated to the time of his arrest; he now faces close to two decades in the slammer and will remain locked up until 9 January 2044.
The convicted rapist, who turned up to Friday’s sentencing with a heavily bandaged face – reportedly the result of a fall-out with a fellow inmate – has two weeks to appeal the sentence if he feels hard done by.
