Outrage in Morocco as 17-year old girl alleges kidnap, rape, torture

A Moroccan teenager has aroused emotions and sparked outrage after alleging kidnap, rape and torture by some fifteen individuals for two months in Oulad Ayyad, in the administrative region of Morroco.

“They sequestrated me for almost two months, raped and tortured, I will never forgive them, they destroyed me,” she said on a video where she shows gritty tattoos and traces of burning cigarettes on her body.

Her lawyer, Brahim Hachane says doctors who examined her have said her plight was worrying.

‘‘For us the first thing we will ask before the investigating judge during the session of September 6, 2018, is to make a medical expertise to define the psychological and physical after-effects of the victim. She is a minor, according to family code 209, who has been kidnapped, confined, raped and tortured physically and mentally by offenders, some of whom have a criminal record’‘, Hachane said.

Twelve Moroccans aged between 18 and 27 years, suspected of having participated in the gang rape of the 17-year-old teenage girl, have been placed in pre detention trial, a judicial source said on Tuesday.

The Attorney General of the Criminal Division of the Court of Appeal of Beni Mellal has decided to prosecute those whom she accused and placed them in preventive detention before entrusting the investigation to an examining magistrate, the source said.

The main suspect, aged 20, is being prosecuted for ‘trafficking a minor human being’, ‘rape’, ‘threat of murder’, ‘torture’ and ‘use of weapons that caused injuries’ and ‘psychological traum’a. Other charges include ‘constituting an organized gang’ and ‘kidnapping’, the source added.

According to the source, three other suspects are being sought by the police.

Khadija “is still in shock even if she tries to be strong, her hands are shaking when she speaks,” Loubna El Joud, a member of the NSAT Association in Marrakech, told AFP.

“Several volunteer doctors have offered to remove her tattoos but dermatologist recommends patience because of the state her skin, according to Okkarou.

In recent days, relatives of the suspects accused Khadija Okkarou of ‘lies and denounced her way of life’ to the Moroccan press. They said such accusations were “deprave”.

AFP