Finland Times

People going to the courtroom of Helsinki District Court on May 4 May 2015 where the trial of Tapanila rape case began. Photo – Lehtikuva.

Three men were sentenced to conditional imprisonment for gang raping a woman outside the Tapanila rail station in March this year.

Of the five accused, one was sentenced to a year and four months, two others were each handed one-year prison sentences while two others were acquitted.

According to the court, the miscreants trailed the woman from Tapanila train station. Two of the men slapped the woman's behind which forced her to stop.

They started to assault the woman who freed herself from the clutches of the miscreants, started to scream and even scratched one of the rapists. At that point the rapists fled.

The District Court held that the rape was not aggravated despite the large number of perpetrators. The court based its ruling on the manner in which the crime was executed and that the rape itself was short lived.

The prosecutor Eija Velitski called for unconditional sentence to be handed to the five accused men. The court, however, ruled that two of the accused were not at fault.

Velitski expressed dissatisfaction regarding the penalty.

"In my view, this is aggravated rape and not rape. It was carried out by many people. It was done at a public place and it is embarrassing," Velitski said.

The court lowered the penalty for the trio due to the exceptional publicity which the case was accorded. According to legal assistants, the accused were threatened.

One of the perpetrators has been going to a school far away due to security reasons and one fears walking outside.

The penalty for two of the accused was also softened as they were under the age of 18.