Long prison terms for luring two women into prostitution

Both in poverty, thought they were coming to work as cleaner and waitress

A PORT SHEPSTONE man received a 25-year jail sentence and his accomplice 16 years and one month for trafficking two Cape Town women into prostitution.

Veeran Palan, 34, and Edwina Norris, 28, were sentenced in the Port Shepstone Regional court on Friday, the Directorate of Public Prosecutions reported.

Palan was sentenced to 10 years for each of two charges of trafficking, one year for keeping a brothel, one year for each kidnapping charge, and one year each for the two charges of procuring a female for sexual exploitation.

The sentences will run concurrently. He was also fined R10 000 or five months imprisonment for benefiting from the proceeds of prostitution.

According to the DPP, Norris was sentenced to six years imprisonment for each of two trafficking charges, one month imprisonment for keeping a brothel, one year each for two kidnapping charges, and one year each for two charges of procuring a female for sexual exploitation, resulting in a total of 16 years and 1 month.

The women, from Delft, were trafficked because Norris, who worked as a prostitute for Palan, wanted to leave prostitution.

Palan told her to buy her freedom she needed to find two women to replace her.

In June 2013 Norris lured the two women, who were both in their twenties (and who she knew from when she lived in Delft), to Port Shepstone.

She promised one a job as a cleaner in a hotel and the other a job as a waitress.

Both women had children, one was married and the other had a partner. Both were living in poverty. They took up the offer of work and Palan sent them bus tickets, cellphone airtime and money to buy food on their trip to Port Shepstone.

Their ordeal started when they arrived. They were taken to a house in Oslo Beach, a village outside of Port Shepstone.

Palan told them they were there to work as prostitutes and that they owed him money for the bus tickets.

Norris bought them lingerie and underwear which they had to wear when meeting clients. The two women had to line up with other women so that clients could select who they wanted to have sex with.

The two women were kept under guard when they wanted to leave the house and Norris supervised them inside.

They were also taken to a stag party where men paid Palan so that they could sleep with whoever of the women they chose.

Yesterday, Directorate of Public Prosecutions Kwa-Zulu Natal spokesperson Natasha Kara said the women were allowed to keep their cellphones, but because they were under constant supervision they were fearful of using them. Kara said one of the women managed to contact her mother when Norris took them to a pub for drinks and he was not sober.

The woman told her mother where they were, her mother immediately contacted an uncle in Mpumalanga who sent the local police a photograph of his niece.

The police arrived and arrested Norris.

Kara said the women’s ordeal lasted three days.

In aggravation of sentence senior state advocate Val Dafel told the court that South Africa is a place of destination, transit and origin for human trafficking.

She said that Palan and Norris’ actions were premeditated and they deceived the complainants for financial gain. She added the accused breached the rights of the complainants by allowing men to choose them for sex; they had no choice in the matter.

Kara added the sentence was welcomed and it was pleasing that the court was taking a stance against human trafficking, a global problem.