Mentally challenged woman attacked
2005-12-08
A MENTALLY challenged woman (22) with the mental capacity of an eight-year-old, was brutally raped after leaving the Paarl Hospital unaccompanied on Sunday morning.
The woman from Khayelitsha had been visiting family in Mbekweni with her mother, when she suffered a severe epileptic fit.
Her mother rushed her to the Paarl Hospital where blood was drawn to determine medication levels. She was told to wait for the results and her mother went back to Mbekweni.
On her return, she was informed that her daughter was no longer there.
The mother received conflicting reports from hospital staff as to what had happened to her daughter. She reported a missing person to the police, after which she returned to the hospital to do further investigation to clarify her daughter's whereabouts.
After questioning a hospital orderly, he recalled that an ambulance had brought in a young lady fitting the daughter’s description. It turned out to be her daughter, who had been found partially naked in an open field opposite the Huguenot Community Hall.
She was very dirty and her body was covered with bruises and grazes. It was later established that the girl had been raped.
“She is so traumatised that she has not spoken since,” the mother said. A charge of rape is being investigated by the police.
A spokesperson of the Paarl Hospital said that they had received the news of the girl with great shock and anger.
He said that when the blood results became available, the patient was called three times, but there was no response. It seemed that she left on her own accord without being officially discharged.
* In another incident, a 27-year-old woman was attacked and raped by three men in Paarl East at 01:00 on Sunday morning after leaving a pub in Jan van Riebeeck Drive, Huguenot. Police have warned the public, especially women, to act responsibly when consuming alcohol.
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