SCANDAL AT SCHOOL * Proprietor of Great Lamptey Mills held for impregnating 16-yr-old

Front Page: Daily Graphic, September 11, 2009.
Story: Albert K. Salia
THE proprietor of Great Lamptey Mills Institute, Enoch Nii Lamptey Mills, has been arrested by the police for impregnating and forcing to marry a 16-year-old former student of his school.
He is alleged to have performed the marriage rites to make his 16-year-old victim his wife, after impregnating the girl who was then a student of Great Lamptey Mills Senior High School at Kasoa.
He is being held on charges of compulsion of marriage of a teenager.
Police sources said one year after the girl gave birth, Mills had failed to keep to his promise of building a house for her, provide for the upkeep of mother and child, as well as restore the girl, who is now 17, to school.
The suspect was arrested on Wednesday evening and spent the night in cells at the Ministries Police Station.
According to the police, the suspect started going out with the victim, who was then in the boarding house of the school at Kasoa, and when the girl became pregnant and informed him and her parents about it, Mills approached the family of the girl to abort the pregnancy.
Her parents, however, declined the suggestion of aborting the foetus, which was then less than two months old, following which Mills offered to perform the marriage rites after asking the girl to stay out of school to take care of herself and the pregnancy.
He also promised to take care of the girl, build a house for her and support her to return to school to continue with her education.
However, according to police sources, after performing the rites, Mills abandoned the girl and her family until he was informed that the girl had given birth.
They said on hearing that the girl had given birth, the suspect informed the family of the girl that he doubted whether he was responsible for the pregnancy and demanded a DNA test to be conducted.
According to the sources, after failing to show up on promised dates for the two parties to go for laboratory samples to be taken for the DNA test to be conducted, the family of the girl reported the matter to the police.
When contacted, the Public Relations Officer of the Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DOVVSU) of the Ghana Police Service, Chief Inspector Irene Oppong, confirmed that the suspect was under custody and assisting in investigations into the matter.
Section 14 (1) of the Children’s Act, 1998 provides that “No person shall force a child: (a) to be betrothed; (b) to be the subject of a dowry transaction; or (c) to be married.
Subsection 2 of Section 14 provides that “the minimum age of marriage of whatever kind shall be 18 years”.
The penalty for contravening the above as stated in section 15 provides that “Any person who contravenes a provision of this sub-part commits an offence and is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding GH¢500 or to a term of imprisonment not exceeding one year or to both”.