First life sentences for human trafficking

A Swazi father was given two life sentences in the Durban Magistrate’s Court on Friday in a case reminiscent of that of Josef Fritzl in Austria nine years ago, says a Sunday Tribune report. In the local case the man was flagged by Interpol last year when the mother of three little girls (aged 11, nine and seven) raised the alarm after they disappeared from their home in Mbabane. The father took his daughters to South Africa and kept them in a rundown house in Jozini for 18 months, repeatedly raping the 11-year-old, his stepdaughter, until she fell pregnant. The children are now living in a place of safety in KwaZulu-Natal in the care of social services. The report notes the sentence has been lauded as a triumph for KZN prosecutors as it is the first time life imprisonment has been handed down for human trafficking. Magistrate Pearl Andrews said the moment the girls stepped on to South African soil in 2015 ‘they became our own children’ and were entitled to the same rights. The report adds that in the Fritzl case he held his daughter Elizabeth prisoner in the basement of the family home for 24 years, during which time she gave birth to seven children. He started abusing her when she was 11.