Woman recognises man from news headlines as her rapist

A man who was accused of committing rape on three women at different massage parlours, was arraigned in court and charged again with raping another woman.

The court, presided by Magistrate Leonard Caruana, heard that in July of last year, the police had been contacted by a woman who told them that she had been raped by the same man that she saw on the news recently. She also claimed he hit her in the face and stole her mobile phone.

She told the police the man’s name was Harona Conateh, from Gambia.

The man had already been charged in court with raping three women of Chinese nationality at various massage parlours located in Sliema and Birkirkara in a time-span of three weeks.

In these cases, the man was also accused of holding victims against their will , committing non-consensual sexual acts and slightly injuring the victims.

One of the women who was allegedly raped by him described her aggressor as “a very bad man”. According to her, he had also attacked another woman but she did not inform the police.

However, this Wednesday, the man was charged with committing rape on another woman, assaulting her, possessing a weapon and also with stealing a mobile phone.

Conateh pleaded not guilty and the accused chose not to answer the questions asked to him.

A protection order was issued by the Court, preventing Conateh from approaching the victim.

Police inspectors Wayne Buhagiar and Clayton Camilleri prosecuted together with lawyers Angele Vella and Nicholas DeGaetano from the Attorney General’s office. Lawyer Alexia Vassallo appeared as legal aid.