Appeal court upholds ‘lenient’ sentence for sexual abuse of 10-year-old

The Court of Appeal has upheld prison sentences of seven, and four years imposed on a man convicted of sexually abusing a 10-year-old child in Limassol, despite describing the punishments as “particularly lenient”. The court dismissed an appeal by Attorney General George Savvides seeking longer sentences, ruling that although the penalties were lenient, they remained within the permissible range and did not justify intervention. The offences took place during the summer of 2018, when the defendant, a Bulgarian national who lived in the same apartment building as the child and was friends with his father, abused the boy while he was at his home. The man was convicted of engaging in a sexual act with a child under 13. The court also heard that the defendant had repeatedly engaged in sexually inappropriate behaviour from his balcony, knowing the child could see him while playing outside his family’s home. The child came from a family experiencing serious social difficulties, as his father was an alcoholic, while his mother had psychiatric problems and had previously been hospitalised; there was also a history of domestic violence in the household. The family frequently changed homes, the child spent considerable periods alone and his school attendance was almost non-existent. The court also heard that he had developmental and emotional difficulties, limited awareness of danger and a tendency to trust others easily, which the defendant had abused to developed a relationship of trust with the child by occasionally looking after him when his parents were unavailable. Savvides argued that the original sentences failed to reflect the seriousness of the offences and the psychological harm suffered by the child. The appeal also argued that insufficient weight had been given to the aggravating circumstances and excessive consideration given to the defendant’s personal and mitigating circumstances. Particular emphasis was placed on the trauma caused by the child having to testify and undergo cross-examination during the proceedings. However, the Court of Appeal found that the Limassol criminal court had adequately considered the circumstances of the offences and the relevant aggravating and mitigating factors. It stressed that an appeal court could only interfere with a sentence if it was manifestly inadequate or excessive, or if the original court had made an error of principle. “Objectively judged, and not as a result of the subjective perception of the members of the Court of Appeal, the imposed sentence, although considered particularly lenient, fluctuating within the permissible framework, nevertheless does not go beyond it to justify our intervention,” the judgment stated. The Attorney General’s appeal was dismissed, leaving the original sentences of seven years for the first offence and four years for the second in force.