Two traffickers get life in jail

TWO MEN suspected of being part of a major human trafficking syndicate have received life sentences for abducting a woman from the Northern Cape and forcing her into prostitution.

Frank Amaku and Ilo Somadina were convicted on six human trafficking charges after snatching Helena Boswell (not her real name) from Upington and keeping her at a home in Fourways, where she and three other women spent months working as prostitutes until they were rescued.

Boswell was only 19 years old when she and at least another three young girls were lured from their homes in Upington with promises of employment in Johannesburg.

There they became part of a human trafficking ring.

Boswell’s detailed testimony resulted in the conviction of two members of the human trafficking ring on human trafficking and kidnapping charges earlier this year– with Amaku convicted on another charge of raping Boswell.

The pair have denied their level of involvement, stating on multiple occasions that they would appeal the conviction.

During judgment, Judge Cassim Moosa acknowledged that young people in the Northern Cape were desperate to escape joblessness and poverty, which was why the offer had been so tempting.

However, when Boswell arrived in Gauteng, the young woman was brought to the home rented out by Amaku and Samadino.

Three other women, two of whom claimed to be the men’s girlfriends, convinced Boswell to listen to the two men or face severe beatings.

She was forced to take crystal meth and other drugs, pose nude for an “escort” website, and taken to the homes of men who paid to have sex with her.

For three months this continued, including an incident where Amaku raped and assaulted her after an argument.

Boswell said she felt trapped because not only was she almost always under the influence of drugs, Amaku threatened to “slaughter” her child and kill her relatives if she tried to contact them.

The women in the home were given only the most basic food, usually custard, Cremora and bread, supposedly meant to keep them sexually ready for the clientele.

Eventually, in April 2016, Boswell worked up the courage to contact her adoptive mother, a member of the SAPS, and another relative after managing to secure a cellphone.

The phone was tracked to the Fourways home, where the four women were rescued and the two men arrested.

Moosa’ judgment further went into painstaking detail about how Boswell had been physically, emotionally and sexually abused by her captors.

Amaku and Somadina were last week left to face the sentencing proceedings alone in the Johannesburg High Court as their advocate, Moleko Ratau, was hospitalised earlier in the week.

During sentencing, Moosa acknowledged the prevalence, yet lack of quantifiable statistics, of human trafficking in South Africa.

“The sexual abuse of women and children, and exploiting them sexually for financial gain, continues countrywide,” Moosa said.

He acknowledged prosecutor Lwazi Ngodwana’s argument that the court had to take into account the “horrific and unimaginable suffering of the victims” of such crimes, and that the pair had never shown remorse for forcing Boswell into drug addiction and prostitution.

Much of Moosa’s ruling was based around a report submitted by Unisa lecturer and human trafficking expert, Marcel van der Watt.

The report detailed the growing problem of human trafficking in South Africa, which is fast becoming one of the top 10 trafficking routes worldwide, and his analysis of Boswell’s case.

Van der Watt had identified five aggravating factors: the pair’s premeditation, the complexity of the crime and its links to other criminal activity such as money laundering, fraud and drug dealing, the dehumanisation of the victims, the use of drugs to push victims into more vulnerable states and the depravity of the sexual acts Boswell was forced to endure.

Moosa also recalled the testimony of Boswell’s adoptive mother, who told the court that her child was still in dire need of psychological counselling, as she had yet to fully recover from her ordeal, and required full-time care since she was rescued.

The pair had failed to give any compelling mitigating arguments during the pre-sentencing proceedings, with Ratau only able to argue that Amaku and Somadina were fairly young, 22 and 27 respectively, and that they had never been convicted of any serious crimes.

Moosa said the country’s rape statistics remained a shocking reminder of the abuse of women and children and that, compounded with the human trafficking, left the court with no choice but to stick with the recommended sentences for such heinous crimes.

“It’s time for the courts to send a clear, crisp and unambiguous message,” Moosa said before sentencing the pair to life imprisonment.