SIBU, Nov 10 — The Sessions Court here yesterday sentenced a man to six years in jail for raping his then underage girlfriend five years ago.

Judge Marutin Pagan convicted the 29-year-old on his own guilty plea to a charge under Section 376(1) of the Penal Code, which provides for up to 20 years’ jail and whipping.

The jail sentence was ordered to commence from today.

The accused committed the offence at a workers’ quarters of a sawmill in Tanjung Kunyit, here at around midnight on Jan 5, 2018.

At the time, the victim was aged 14 years and five months.

The matter came to light in June 2018 when the girl’s mother brought her to a clinic for a checkup as she suspected her daughter was pregnant.

A month later, the girl confessed to her mother to having had sexual intercourse with the accused, and that she was indeed expecting.

This prompted her mother to file a police report which led to the accused’s arrest on July 26, 2018.

The girl gave birth on Oct 11, 2018 and a deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) test confirmed the accused as the baby’s biological father. — Borneo Post