Towards Victim-Centred Sentencing in Sexual Offences against Older Women: IT v S 2021 (2) SACR 494 (GP)

Abstract

This case note examines IT v S 2021 (2) SACR 494 (GP) in which the High Court confirmed a ten-year sentence imposed on a man convicted of raping his 65-year-old neighbour. It asks whether the sentencing process gave adequate effect to a victim-centred approach, understood here as ensuring the complainant’s individual circumstances are placed before the sentencing court and meaningfully weighed, and not merely taking her age into account. While the High Court expressly applied several provisions of the Older Persons Act 13 of 2006 and confirmed the statutory minimum sentence, the information before the Court about the complainant’s health, mobility and psychological impact of the offence was too limited to enable a meaningful assessment of her individual circumstances. This case note argues that the evidentiary gap rather than the absence of judicial engagement with the Older Persons Act is the principal shortcoming exposed by this case and proposes steps for closing it. That gap is compounded by the Older Persons Act, which recognises dignity and the best interests of older persons but fails to establish a mechanism requiring a court to obtain the information needed to give those principles effect at sentencing.