Deeper Life School: Accused Senior Student Denies Assaulting Don-Davis

A senior student who was accused of sexually assaulting Don-Davis Archibong at the Deeper Life High School, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, has denied the allegations levelled against him.

Naija News reports that the victim’s mother, Deborah Okezie had alleged that some senior students of the school assaulted and molested his son repeatedly after the principal moved him to their dormitory for urinating on his bed.

She had also claimed that her son told her the students used to push their hands and legs into his anus while also threatening to kill him if he reported to his parents or the principal, who was recently suspended over the case.

However, in an interview with Vanguard, one of the accused, Shalom Omoniyi, said their boarding master, Nseabasi Joseph, only asked him and another student named Ola to help Don-Davis learn how to keep himself clean.

The 13-year-old Senior School 1 student said the boarding master only gave him the task because Don-Davis was his bunkmate for two weeks.

He said, “Don-Davis was my bunkmate. I resumed at the school on November 1, 2020, to meet him as my bunkmate. But I was told that he was removed from the Junior Students Hostel and put in the Senior Students Hostel because the boarding master of junior school, Mr Akpan, was sick.

“We (Ola and I) did not bully him. I did not molest him. The boarding master, Joseph Nseabasi, asked us to make sure he was always clean because when he pooped or peed on himself, he didn’t clean up. And when he smelled, and we asked him if he defecated, he would say no.

“But when we asked him to pull down his boxers and bend down, we would discover that he defecated without cleaning his anus. We would now ask him to go and take his bath or clean himself. And when we noticed that his clothes were smelling, we would tell him to go and wash the clothes, but he would refuse. Instead, he would go and put the smelly clothes in his cupboard.”

He noted that Don-Davis was moved back to the Junior Students Hostel when Akpan returned before the end of the term on December 19, 2020.

Omoniyi also said that Don-Davis might have been angry that they (he and Ola) didn’t do the things the boarding master, Akpan, was doing for him before he fell ill, noting, “Mr Akpan used to wash his clothes, bathe him. He also helped him to brush his teeth.

“Mr Akpan returned to School before school closed on December 19, 2020. When he returned, Don-Davis was also moved back to his former hostel. He was moved to the Senior Students Hostel because when Mr Akpan was sick, the Junior Students Hostel did not have a boarding master. He was moved out of our hostel on November 15.”

Omoniyi also said a female nurse used to come at 6:30 am to give Don-Davis drugs every day on an empty stomach.

Asked if the School punished him and Ola for allegedly bullying and molesting Don-Davis, Omoniyi said he was never punished.

He said: “Don-Davis reported us to the school principal, (Mrs Ndidi Solomon, already suspended) that Ola and I bullied him. The principal invited us to her office and told us that she was going to punish us. Even when we tried to explain things to her, she refused to listen. But she did not punish us.”