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Offender Databases Abdirazak Mussa

Abdirazak Yussuf Mussa

Alias

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Offences

Abduction and rape of a Wellington woman in his taxi in September 2006

Victims

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Offender Affiliations

.

Gang affiliations

none known

Age

Born 1952

Current Location

Prison

Parole/Release Dates

Sentenced to eleven years in November 2007
Resentenced after retrial to nine years in April 2009

Background
NZ Herald story here and here with Radioworks story here
TVNZ story here
Latest sentencing here

The Dominion Post, 23rd November 2007
A teenager raped twice by a taxi driver says her life became a "hellish living nightmare" when she was later told by police that he was HIV positive. The young woman, 18 at the time of the attack, had been taken to a Miramar house, locked in and attacked by Abdirazak Yussuf Mussa, 55, who wore two condoms each time he held her down and raped her. Yesterday, before he was jailed for 11 years for the two rapes and a charge of abduction, the victim said she waited in terror for months to hear her fate.

"It was not bad enough what he did to me but now there was a chance I might get Aids," she said in a victim impact statement read to Wellington District Court. She was later told she did not have the disease. Mussa, a Somali refugee, continues to deny the attacks, claiming the sex was consensual.

Judge Susan Thomas said that at about 5.30am on September 3 last year the victim got into Mussa's taxi in Courtenay Place and asked to be taken home. Instead, Mussa began asking her to go to his home for a drink which she declined repeatedly. But when he would not give up, the victim gave in, saying she would have one drink. They stopped at a supermarket, where Mussa bought alcohol, and he then drove to his home where he took her inside, locked the door and raped her twice.

Judge Thomas said the victim's world collapsed on being told he was HIV positive. She did not accept a submission from his lawyer that in wearing two condoms Mussa was being responsible about his disease. She said he had abused a position of trust as a taxi driver picking up young women. "She trustingly got into your taxi, trusting she would be safe," she told Mussa. Judge Thomas refused the Crown's application for Mussa to serve half his sentence before being able to seek parole.

Mussa's lawyer, Sandy Baigent, said he had been a supportive and responsible father, helping to care for his son, who died several years ago from a neurological problem, and also his Down syndrome daughter. Ms Baigent said if Mussa had worn a condom he was not legally obliged to tell the sexual partner he was HIV positive - whether the sex was consensual or not.

Crown prosecutor Tom Gilbert said reading the victim impact statement was disturbing and part of the reality of sexual assault in New Zealand. He said the victim's life would continue to be devastated long after Mussa was freed from prison.

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Corrections and Additional Information
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