Dubai: A woman and her daughter have been jailed for 10 years for forging passports to fly in young girls to Dubai and forcing them into prostitution.
A 16-year-old Iraqi girl absconded from a villa, where she was being forced to have sex with strangers, and took shelter at a Sharjah mosque for three days in May 2017.
The girl met a Palestinian woman at the mosque and told her about her ordeal, who took her to a police station.
The 16-year-old victim told anti-human trafficking police officers that a 64-year-old Iraqi woman incited her to run away from her parents’ house in Baghdad, provided her with a forged passport, flew her to Dubai and made her work in prostitution with her 32-year-old daughter.
Police raided the villa where the 32-year-old woman had kept girls under her supervision and coerced them to have sex with strangers for Dh1,500 to Dh6,000 per client.
An anti-human trafficking police squad raided the villa in Al Khawaneej area at 3am, seized Dh104,000 in cash and a marriage contract and freed a number of girls, who were allegedly being forced into prostitution. Police apprehended the 32-year-old Iraqi woman.
On Sunday, the Dubai Court of First Instance convicted the 64-year-old mother and her 32-year-old daughter of human trafficking for bringing young girls [aged between 15 and 17] to Dubai and coercing them to work in the sex trade.
Presiding judge Mohammad Jamal sentenced the mother, who remains at large, in absentia.
The defendants will be deported following the completion of their punishments.
The mother and her daughter forged the ages and names of the girls on travel documents to be able to bring them to Dubai and forced them into prostitution against their will, said records.
The daughter sexually exploited another female suspect [who has been deported] by making her work in prostitution and pocketing the profits.
She pleaded not guilty.
One of the victims said she was flown to Dubai along with her younger sister with forged passports.
“We were coerced to work in prostitution … they made us stay in a villa. One day, they took us to a villa in Abu Dhabi where there was a party and too many men were present. One man made me dance for him while my younger sister was taken to a side room where she was forced to have sex with a stranger. When I saw her plight, she and I cried. The accused made us to have sex with men for Dh1,500 to Dh6,000 that she took for herself,” she testified.
Another girl told prosecutors that the suspect used to make them dress in sexy outfits and promote their photos to clients via WhatsApp.
The daughter’s ruling remains subject to appeal meanwhile the mother is entitled a retrial since she was sentenced in absentia.
