Private school teacher freed of rape charge

A Berbice private school teacher was on Tuesday freed of a rape charge after he was found not guilty.
Zafiel Yusuf, 27, of Fyrish Village, Corentyne, was on trial before Justice Jo Ann Barlow and a mixed jury in the Berbice High Court. The charge had stated that he raped a 14-year-old girl and her 15-year-old brother.
The trial was held in camera. Both teens testified during the trial against the private school teacher.
It was alleged that Yusuf went to the teenagers’ home and requested to see their mother and told her that he had hampers to give to poor people and if she wanted one, she would have to send her children with him to collect it. The court heard that the children got into his car and Yusuf stopped at a Chinese restaurant and asked them if they wanted beer to drink.
It was alleged that the siblings were later taken down a dam, next to a clump of bushes, where the girl was told to perform a sexual act on Yusuf. The prosecution’s case also stated that she refused and was cuffed and told that she would be killed if she did not comply. It is alleged that her brother was also forced to do the same after his sister.
Following the allegations in April 2017, the accused’s father, Hafeez Yusuf, a political columnist, claimed that the incident did not occur and that the mother of the teenagers was out to get money from him.