A 14-year-old boy was arrested on Friday after allegedly raping his 8-year-old neighbor in Kompong Thom province, with police saying the teenager had confessed and blamed the crime on pornography.
Deputy Stung Sen City police chief Suo Chea said the young girl’s parents had gone out in the morning and left her at home in her grandmother’s care, with the boy convincing her at about 8 a.m. to come to his own grandmother’s home about 100 meters away.
“When they arrived at his stilted house, that guy pulled the victim onto a wooden reclining chair and removed her skirt,” Mr. Chea said. “He covered her mouth and raped her. When he saw she had lost a lot of blood, the suspect let the girl go back home.”
The girl immediately informed her grandmother about what had happened, leading the family to inform police, he said.
“After the filing of the complaint from the family of the victim, the commune police went to arrest the suspect, who was hiding at his house, for questioning,” he said. “He confessed to raping the girl.”
Mr. Chea said the teenager was kept in police custody before being sent to court on Saturday.
Chea Poeun, chief of the provincial police’s serious crimes bureau, said the suspect had moved to Kompong Thom from Kompong Chhnang province in the past year, after his mother died and his father took a new wife.
“Yesterday, the deputy prosecutor questioned him but did not decide whether to charge him, and sent him back to my police custody,” Mr. Poeun said.
“This morning we sent him to the provincial court again for questioning but the court officials were on holiday so we brought him back to the police office,” he said, adding the boy would be sent back to court today.
Mr. Poeun said the suspect had told him that he was watching pornography on his friend’s smartphone prior to committing his crime, and could not stop himself from assaulting the young girl.
