The man, who is in his fifties, admitted to having abused his daughter several times a week between 1998 and 2000, reports the Göteborgs-Posten newspaper.
According to the prosecutor, the attacks began as early as 1993 when the girl was eight-years-old and too young to understand that her stepfather’s behaviour constituted sexual abuse.
A social worker who visited the family at the time suspected that something was amiss, but never received any reports of abuse.
Eventually the girl’s older sister reported the attacks to police.
The man first denied the accusations, but later confessed during remand hearings. He was officially charged in August of last year with serious sexual assault of a child and child rape.
Prosecutor Per-Åke Kvarnström had hoped the stepfather would get the maximum sentence of 12 years on account of the man having taken advantage of the girl’s position of dependence on him, and the fact that the attacks took place over a long period of time.
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