Criminal Court to hold Wednesday hearing in child‑sex abuse case against Sunny Umar

Dr. Hussain Sunny Umar, who is accused of sexually assaulting several children, is scheduled to appear in the Criminal Court on Wednesday afternoon.

Sunny Umar will appear for the trial of four charges filed against him. According to the Criminal Court schedule, the closed‑door hearing will be held at 2 pm on Wednesday.

Under Article 42 of the Constitution, trials must be conducted in public. However, judges may order closed hearings in exceptional circumstances.

Cases involving children are among the circumstances in which hearings may be closed, in order to protect the interests of minors. Even when a hearing is closed, the verdict must be delivered in a public session, although the court may withhold certain information in juvenile and family‑related cases.

Sunny has been charged with three counts of intentionally touching the body of a child with sexual intent, filed in three separate cases. These include allegations of sexual assault of a child from the age of seven until August last year, as well as two additional cases of assault. Each offence carries a prison sentence of between 10 and 14 years.

He has also been charged with obstruction of justice for failing to hand over his phone to police after the court ordered him to do so. The basic punishment for this offence is one year, seven months and six days in prison.

In addition, he has been charged with providing false information to an official agency. He allegedly forged SIM card information and gave false information to police. This offence carries a sentence of four months and 24 days.

Sunny has been held in custody since January and will remain detained until the end of the trial.