Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

A $15,000 do­na­tion to the Rape Cri­sis So­ci­ety of T&T has earned a con­vict­ed rapist a two-year re­duc­tion in his sen­tence.

Mark Cal­va­hal was con­vict­ed at the end of his judge-alone tri­al ear­li­er this month and was sen­tenced by High Court Judge Kathy-Ann Wa­ter­man-Latchoo to a lit­tle un­der sev­en years in prison yes­ter­day.

Jus­tice Wa­ter­man-Latchoo be­gan with a start­ing point of 12 years be­fore re­duc­ing it by two years be­cause of Cal­va­hal’s do­na­tion.

Cal­va­hal had ini­tial­ly of­fered to pay com­pen­sa­tion to the vic­tim but she re­fused to ac­cept it and asked that it be paid to the NGO, which pro­vides pro­fes­sion­al coun­selling to vic­tims of sex­u­al and gen­der-based vi­o­lence.

Jus­tice Wa­ter­man-Latchoo gave a fur­ther two-year dis­count as Cal­va­hal had a clean crim­i­nal record be­fore be­ing charged in 2012.

He was al­so giv­en a one-year dis­count as his son, who he is the guardian of, has a se­ri­ous med­ical con­di­tion.

Af­ter de­duct­ing the two weeks he spent in prison af­ter be­ing con­vict­ed, Cal­va­hal was left with a sen­tence of six years, 11 months, and two weeks.

As part of his sen­tence, Cal­va­hal was or­dered to re­port to the Mar­aval Po­lice Sta­tion to reg­is­ter as a sex of­fend­er with­in sev­en days of his even­tu­al re­lease.

Af­ter the ini­tial reg­is­tra­tion, he must re­port to the po­lice every three months for six years.

Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher was al­so di­rect­ed to pub­lish in­for­ma­tion rel­a­tive to his con­vic­tion on the pub­lic sex of­fend­er web­site.

Cal­va­hal, a 44-year-old con­struc­tion work­er, was ac­cused of at­tack­ing the woman, who was a fel­low ten­ant at the apart­ment build­ing he lived at, on Oc­to­ber 5, 2012.

Ac­cord­ing to the ev­i­dence, pre­sent­ed by State pros­e­cu­tor Dy­lan Mar­tin, af­ter the woman re­turned home from work, Cal­va­hal re­port­ed­ly came to her apart­ment to dis­cuss some items she had pur­chased from one of his friends.

The woman told him that his friend had de­liv­ered items she did not or­der and he in­sist­ed that they go to the friend’s home to ex­change the items.

Af­ter com­plet­ing the trans­ac­tion, Cal­va­hal told the woman that he want­ed to show her a spring in Mar­aval.

He drove to a dark and des­o­late area where he claimed the spring was lo­cat­ed.

When the woman got out of the car and did not see the spring, she de­mand­ed that he take her back home.

He re­fused and raped her in the car. Af­ter be­ing dropped off, the vic­tim re­port­ed the at­tack to the po­lice and was med­ical­ly ex­am­ined.

Cal­va­hal was charged af­ter blood from a cut the vic­tim sus­tained in the at­tack was found on his car seat and was test­ed by a foren­sic an­a­lyst.

Af­ter Mar­tin fin­ished pre­sent­ing the State’s case, Cal­va­hal tes­ti­fied in his de­fence and de­nied any wrong­do­ing as he claimed that she con­sent­ed.

His friend, who the vic­tim pur­chased the items from, al­so tes­ti­fied.

Pros­e­cu­tor Niara Boodan ap­peared along­side Mar­tin for the Of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP).