Legal Brief: Rape as a Penal Offence in the Nigerian Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act, 2015: A Forensic Investigative Approach.

The Nigeria Violence against Persons (Prohibition) Act prohibits all forms of violence against persons while providing maximum protection and remedies for victims and punishment of offenders. Sections 1, 2, 3 and 4 provides for the offence of rape, defines the offence and punishment for offenders. Interesting as the provisions and severe as the punishment may be, successful investigation and prosecution of rapists are predicated upon standard forensic investigative procedures. However, available statistics reveal discrepancies between the cases reported and the number of convictions. Hence, the contention of this paper that the discrepancies is either that these forensic investigative procedures are hitherto neglected or little attention has been paid to them during investigation of rape cases thereby resulting in loss of cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]