Nurse who used voodoo to smuggle prostitutes gets 14 years
‘Forced to eat chicken hearts’
A NURSE who used voodoo to lure women from Nigeria to work as prostitutes was jailed for 14 years yesterday.
Josephine Iyamu ran a lucrative human trafficking ring from her two-bedroom flat while working as an agency nurse in London NHS hospitals.
The 51-year- old spent her gains on luxuries and financing a political career in Nigeria – claiming that she wanted to ‘empower women and families’.
Instead she treated women like ‘commodities’, putting them in mortal danger to pay for her lavish lifestyle. She splashed out £700 on designer shoes and bought a mansion with servants’ quarters in Benin as well as a £400,000 London home.
Iyamu charged five vulnerable women up to £ 33,000 for a treacherous journey to Germany after indoctrinating them with black voodoo magic.
In the juju ceremonies the naked young women were beaten with bloody chicken carcasses and forced to eat chicken hearts and drink blood containing worms. They had to swear loyalty to Iyamu on pain of death.
The victims endured a nightmarish five-day journey to the Libyan coast – on the way being shot at, ambushed and gangraped. Iyamu told them this was normal and even charged one of them £ 440 for an abortion following a rape.
The five were loaded onto an inflatable boat crammed with hundreds of migrants travelling to Italy. They had to be rescued at sea and headed to Germany to work in the sex trade – and pay Iyamu back.
The scam was uncovered when a brothel owner reported his suspicions about the women to German police. They alerted the UK National Crime Agency which launched an investigation into the case even though it took place abroad.
Iyamu, who is a Liberian national, was given leave to remain in Britain in 2009 because of her nursing qualifications. She claimed to be earning only £14,500 a year. Following a trial at Birmingham Crown Court she was found guilty last week of five counts of arranging or facilitating travel for sexual exploitation and perverting the course of justice.
She is the first person to be convicted under the Modern Slavery Act of 2015.
Iyamu was arrested at Heathrow on August 24 last year when travelling back from Nigeria. Police found seven mobile phones and more than 30 SIM cards linking her to the German brothel workers.
Officers also discovered a piece of paper detailing items needed for juju ceremonies.
Sentencing Iyamu to 14 years, Judge Richard Bond said: ‘You recruited young women to work as prostitutes in a foreign land to make large amounts of money for your own benefit.
‘These were desperate women who worked to make their lives better and their families’ lives better. You showed a complete disregard for their welfare.
‘You saw them not as living, breathing human beings but as commodities to earn you large sums of money.
‘All five of your victims had to be rescued from the boat they were on, before being put into a camp in Italy. You understood the potential dangers, you simply did not care.’
After the case, Kay Mellor of the National Crime Agency said Iyamu targeted the vulnerable.
‘She thought living in a different country to where her crimes were committed would protect her,’ she added.
‘Working closely with our Nigerian and German colleagues however we were able to bring her to justice right here in the UK.
‘Her expenditure on travel and properties far outweighed her legitimate earnings as a nurse and our investigation into her finances is ongoing.’