Young man gets lengthy jail term for multiple rapes

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The Helsinki District Court has convicted a 22-year-old man of several rapes he committed last summer in Helsinki. Edwin Aseda Opudo was sentenced to three years and nine months in prison, for four rapes and one assault.
      According to the District Court, Opudo raped four women aged between under 30 to slightly over 40 at the turn of the months of July and August 2006.
      The man was ordered to pay compensation to the women for mental anguish as well as pain and suffering. The largest individual sum is EUR 7,000, ordered for one woman's mental suffering.
      The assaulted man did not demand any compensation.
     
Opudo was remanded in custody last August and charged with the rape of a woman under 30 years of age. The act took place in a flat in Helsinki.
      At that point the description of the man was published and his possible other victims were asked to contact the police.
      The police reported that the man used to impose himself on strange women and that his behaviour was sexually threatening.
      In October 2005 the man had been convicted of raping a woman in the Kaisaniemi Park in the previous summer. He was released on probation just a few weeks prior to the new rapes for which he was now convicted.
     
The Directorate of Immigration has ordered that Opudo, who is a Kenyan citizen, should be deported, while he has appealed the decision to the Helsinki Administrative Court. The processing of the appeal is to start in the near future.
      The trial for last summer's rapes began already in October. However, the decision of the District Court was handed out only now, as the accused had first been sent for a psychiatric examination.
      After having undergone the examination, the man was found to have been criminally responsible for his actions.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Street crime declining in Helsinki - sex offences go down by half (21.3.2006
  Fewer crimes in Helsinki in January 2006 (7.3.2006)

Links:
  Directorate of Immigration

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