A 23-year-old man who allegedly confessed to the rape and murder of a 12-year-old girl in Kratie province’s Sambor district is scheduled to be charged in provincial court today.

Ka Sovann, a worker at China Dynamic rubber company in the district, and who lived in the same village as the victim, ran into the girl at about 5pm on Friday as he left work, said Touch Sitha, deputy police chief of O’Krieng commune.

“The perpetrator came out of the rubber plantation and invited her to go back to the village with him; on the way, he raped her,” Sitha said yesterday. “The suspect told police that he did not intend to kill her after he raped her, but because the girl knew him, he broke her neck and dragged her to a nearby pond and left her.”

As villagers and police searched for the missing girl, Sovann told the victim’s mother that he had seen the girl “dying and floating in a watering hole”, an admission which brought him to the attention of police, Sitha said.

He is expected to be charged with the rape and murder of a child today.