Rhon­dor Dowlat

The 29-year-old "PH" taxi dri­ver charged with sex­u­al groom­ing of an 11-year-old girl was greet­ed by jeers from cu­ri­ous on­look­ers as he en­tered the Ch­agua­nas Mag­is­trates' Court yes­ter­day.

When Neil Bisses­sar, of Sankar Dri­ve, Long­denville, was tak­en out of a marked po­lice van just out­side the court's premis­es, the peo­ple who were gath­ered in the hot sun on the road­way no­ticed his right hand in a hard cast.

One man shout­ed: "You lucky. More of you should have been bro­ken."

A woman chimed in: "You need more licks."

It is al­leged that Bisses­sar, on two oc­ca­sions, sent sev­er­al mes­sages via tele­phone and so­cial me­dia to an 11-year-old girl, al­leged­ly telling her to send pic­tures of her­self and even ask­ing to come over to her house. On Thurs­day night, he al­leged­ly made his way to the girl's house and was con­front­ed by a group of vil­lagers. He was sub­se­quent­ly beat­en and strapped by vil­lagers as they wait­ed on the po­lice.

Bisses­sar was even­tu­al­ly tak­en to the Long­denville Po­lice Post and the Ch­agua­nas Health Fa­cil­i­ty where he was treat­ed for in­juries he sus­tained. He was charged with the of­fence by PC Corey Williams of the Long­denville Po­lice Post on Sat­ur­day and ap­peared in court at 1.42 pm yes­ter­day.

When he was es­cort­ed in­to the First Court court­room, Bisses­sar was seen look­ing at the peo­ple seat­ed in the pub­lic gallery. His eyes then fixed on the girl's moth­er, who was al­so seat­ed in the court­room wait­ing for the mat­ter to be called.

Short­ly be­fore 2 pm, Bisses­sar was called be­fore Mag­is­trate Joanne O'Con­nor. His at­tor­ney, Tara­dath Singh, told the mag­is­trate his client com­plained that he was beat­en by peo­ple on Thurs­day night. Singh said as a re­sult of the beat­ing his client suf­fered a bro­ken mid­dle fin­ger on the right hand, spinal in­juries and bruis­es about the body.

Singh asked the mag­is­trate to con­sid­er grant­i­ng Bisses­sar bail, as his client had no pre­vi­ous con­vic­tions and was a mem­ber of the King­dom Hall of Je­ho­vah's Wit­ness­es for sev­er­al years.

But O'Con­nor said Bisses­sar was charged un­der the Chil­dren Act 2012 and did not call up­on him to plead. She re­mand­ed him in­to cus­tody pend­ing trac­ing as con­firmed by Court Pros­e­cu­tor Sgt Ken Ali, who said they were await­ing re­sults.

Speak­ing with re­porters af­ter his client's ap­pear­ance, Singh said on sum­ma­ry con­vic­tion, his client can face a fine of $50,000 and im­pris­on­ment for ten years or on con­vic­tion on in­dict­ment, a fine of $100,000 and im­pris­on­ment for 20 years.

Bisses­sar is to reap­pear be­fore O'Con­nor to­mor­row.

Chil­dren Act 2012

Meet­ing a child fol­low­ing sex­u­al groom­ing

25. (1) Where a per­son has on at least two ear­li­er oc­ca­sions, met or com­mu­ni­cat­ed with a child in Trinidad and To­ba­go or else­where, by any means, in­clud­ing the In­ter­net, for the pur­pose of sex­u­al groom­ing, and he meets, at­tempts to meet or trav­els for the pur­pose of meet­ing the child in Trinidad and To­ba­go or else­where with the in­ten­tion of do­ing any­thing to or in re­spect of the child, dur­ing or af­ter the meet­ing, which if done in Trinidad and To­ba­go would con­sti­tute the com­mis­sion of an of­fence un­der Part V and this Part, the per­son com­mits an of­fence.

(2) A per­son who com­mits an of­fence un­der sub­sec­tion (1) is li­able�

(a) on sum­ma­ry con­vic­tion, to a fine of fifty thou­sand dol­lars and to im­pris­on­ment for ten years; or

(b) on con­vic­tion on in­dict­ment, to a fine of one hun­dred thou­sand dol­lars and to im­pris­on­ment for twen­ty years.

(3) For the pur­pos­es of this sec­tion, "sex­u­al groom­ing" means gain­ing the trust of a child, or of a per­son who takes care of the child, for the pur­pose of sex­u­al ac­tiv­i­ty with the child.