Teenager tells court of introduction to commercial sex

A CASE, in which it is alleged that four under-age girls were recruited from Berbice and transported to Itaballi in Essequibo County for sexual exploitation, is being heard by Magistrate Adela Nagamootoo at the New Amsterdam Court.

Among the witnesses is the now 17-year-old mother of a two-year old son.
On Monday, a 16-year-old told the court she was menstruating when she was ordered to do striptease for the entertainment of male customers.
On trial are Candace Abigale Anderson and her common-law husband, Wesley Hart alias ‘Stone’, for allegedly trafficking in persons.
The couple, of Lot 76 Middle Street, Pouderoyen, West Bank  Demerara, were initially placed on $250,000 each and are expected to return to court on March 4 for the continuation.
The alleged victim related that on April 15 last, having left New Amsterdam with the defendants, they travelled to Georgetown and then to Parika, from where they journeyed by boat to Bartica, where three rooms were booked at a hotel for Abigale and Hart.
The witness said she and the three other girls had to sleep with the woman’s son.
She said, on April 17, having left the hotel; they drove, by car, to the stelling from where they took a boat to Itaballi. However, neither Abigale nor Hart were present. Those two arrived about an hour later and then the group boarded a cruiser.
Along the way, Abigail told them to say they were 18 years old. The teen said, prior to them passing the police checkpoint, she, another girl and Abigale’s son disembarked and walked through a shortcut on foot and rejoined the party on the other side.
The teenager, who is currently enrolled in the private educational system, recounted that, on arrival at a shop at a place called Oko, the girls had a bath after which Abigale called them and told them that they came to have sex to pay her back her money.

DO STRIPTEASE
“Abigale told us we have to do striptease. I told her no. I told her that I was seeing ‘my period’. There were two other girls at Oko. One of them advised me to take a panty liner and insert it in my vagina. I went into a room. Abigale brought a bottle each of Guinness Stout and Banko wine. She said, if we did not drink it we will have to walk to Itaballi. I drank the mixed drinks. The other girls drank too. My head started to swing,” the witness related.
Continuing, she said: “I had on a short pants and a brassiere. Another girl joined me. She had on a panty and a brassiere. We were on a stage dancing to music. There were lots of men near the stage. They were drinking and smoking. One of the men was coming close. He was coming to touch me. But one of the girls stopped him. After dancing for a hour, I went to my bed. The following day, one of the girls knocked at my door, saying someone came to have sex with me. I told her I am having my health.”
The witness said, the following day, she saw Abigale slap the other teenager who had testified earlier, because she was not willing to comply with her wishes.
The teen said, on Friday, April 20, the police came and woke them, took them outside and started to question Abigale and Hart, as well. Three policemen then took them to Bartica were they gave statements and were, later, taken to the hospital where malaria tests were conducted on them.
The witness said a subsequent trip was made to Georgetown where they met a Ms. Green and were taken to the Mahaica Help and Shelter, at which location they met the two girls who had escaped from Oko.
The witness, who hailed from Angoy’s Avenue, New Amsterdam, told the court she was not afraid during the trip to Itaballi and Oko as she had been taken to the interior before, at age 14, by a woman named Suzanne.
She remembered: “I spent two months in the bush (the interior).I went there to have sex and was being paid with gold. Earlier Abigale had told me that I was going to work in a shop.”
Meanwhile, the defendants were unrepresented as they claimed their lawyer’s car had broken down along the East Coast Demerara Road. They declined cross-examination.

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