A case of five years’ imprisonment for rape must be heard in the district court

In both the city and county courts, a now 19-year-old man has confessed that one summer night last year he entered a house in Lemvig and raped the woman who lived there.

On Monday, the Western District Court was scheduled to sentence the young man. But it does not happen.

– It is not believed that his confession covers the entire indictment, so it must therefore be reconsidered, states the court.

The case is sent back to the Court in Holstebro, which must process the case again. It was this district court which in March concluded that the 19-year-old should be punished with five years’ imprisonment for rape and deprivation of liberty of the woman.

He has explained that he had seen the woman in question in the house’s garden, and on July 25 at around 01:30 he entered the house to rape her.

He had duct tape with him, and he used it to tape her hands and feet together, after which the two-hour deprivation of liberty and the rape began.

Barely a month later, the 19-year-old returned to the address to rape the woman again. But the door was locked and a dog barked when he tried to open the door, he said.

A forensic psychiatric examination has been carried out on the man, which shows that he is normally gifted at the low end of the scale.

He appears immature and socially inept with little capacity for empathy and recognition of his own responsibility. However, he was without signs of psychopathy.

In the district court, the woman was awarded compensation of DKK 150,000.

The case came before the high court because the 19-year-old appealed the district court’s verdict in the hope of a lighter sentence. The prosecution had counter-appealed. It would have given him a more severe sentence than the five years.

/ritzau/