RICARDO Maniram, called “Rocky”, was on Tuesday freed of a rape charge by the Sexual Offences Court of the Demerara High Court, after a jury returned a ‘not guilty’ verdict.
Maniram, of Crown Dam, Cummings Lodge, East Coast Demerara, was on trial before Justice Simone Morris-Ramlall for allegedly engaging in sexual penetration with a 16-year-old girl back in October 2014. The jury, after deliberating for almost two hours, found Maniram not guilty of having raped the child. According to reports, the girl was at home alone when Maniram, who lived in her community at the time, went into her yard and inserted his penis into her vagina. Some seven months later, in June 2015 to be precise, after teachers complained that the victim was looking pregnant, her parents took her to do an ultrasound, and lo and behold, the results revealed that she was eight months pregnant. Maniram was arrested and reportedly told the police that the victim had consented to having sex with him.