A 42-year old Somali man abducted and raped a 12-year-old who was ...

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Transcript

00:00This is Savannah Hernandez standing in front of the Alkazan Islamic Center in St. Paul, Minnesota.

00:05Now I'm standing here because this mosque has made national headlines after they penned a letter of community support

00:12for a Somali immigrant who sexually assaulted a 12-year-old.

00:16Now back in 2024, this perpetrator was charged after abducting a 12-year-old from her backyard,

00:23forcing her into his vehicle and then sexually assaulting her.

00:26He has since been convicted of first-degree criminal sexual assault.

00:31Now after being convicted, his family members were sending letters to the judge

00:35to ask the judge to consider his character when making that sentencing.

00:40And one of those letters came from the Alkazan Islamic Center.

00:43It was actually signed by their executive director stating that he had to face cultural differences

00:49and the challenges of taking on a new culture.

00:51They also framed him as a family-oriented man who sends his money oftentimes back to his family members in Somalia.

00:59The judge actually gave him the lightest sentencing possible.

01:03He is only going to be serving eight years in jail for this crime.

01:06He was sentenced to 12 years, but those last four years are going to be spent out of jail and on probation.

01:13By the way, going back to that point about the challenges of a different culture,

01:17this perpetrator has been in the United States of America since 2006.

01:22So he's been in the United States for 19 years.

01:24He was born in Somalia, but he has been here for almost two decades at this point.

01:29However, the culture coming into play when it comes to, as the Islamic Center put it,

01:35this situation, the situation of course being him sexually assaulting and abducting a 12-year-old girl.

01:41So just wanted to give you guys an idea of some of these stories,

01:45some of the cultural impact happening here in Minnesota as it relates to the Somali community.