South African woman sentenced to life imprisonment for missing girl trafficking, 6

On Thursday, a judge in South Africa sentenced a woman to life prison after being found guilty of having sold her 6-year-old daughter, who is still missing, in a case that has captured and horrified the South Africans.

The woman, Racquel Smith, 35, sat stoically while the judge pronounced the sentence after a three -month trial in a city on the west coast of South Africa. The mother and two men were found guilty earlier this month after removing and treating her older child, Joshlin Smith, for operations.

“The accused has not shown remorse,” said Judge, Nathan Erasmus on Thursday, adding him to the eve of the sentence, the mother “has always lied”. The two men were also sentenced to life prison Thursday, the minimum sentence for the kidnapping and slavery of children in South Africa.

The daughter disappeared in February 2024 from a hut which she shared with her mother, two brothers and sisters and her mother’s boyfriend in the seaside town of Saldanha bay, on the west coast of the country. Police, naval officers and members of the community have painted the city, but the daughter was never found.

A photo of the girl was plastered throughout the city, then in the national media. Two weeks after research, police arrested his mother; The boyfriend of his mother, Jacquin Appollis; And a friend of the couple, Steveno van Rhyn.

Prosecutors said the mother was dependent on drugs and sold the girl for 20,000 rands, about $ 1,100.

The public interest in the case was so high that legal proceedings were held in a community center in Saldanha Bay and broadcast on national television.

During the trial, the mother and the other two suspects refused to testify. On May 2, when they were sentenced, a judge judged that the girl had been sold in slavery.

The prosecutors pleaded for a perpetuity imprisonment, urging the judge to consider that the child was always missing.

“We do not have it, we do not know where it is, but that is why the state has provided evidence to give it a voice, because it is not before the court,” said Eric Ntabazalila, spokesperson for the National Authority for Prosecutor of South Africa, in a statement.

Many questions about the case persist. But Ms. Smith has constantly refused to disclose any information on the disappearance of her daughter, even after the daughter’s paternal grandmother’s pleas, Rita Yon.

The two younger brothers and sisters of Joshlin often asked after their sister, said Ms. Yon.

“We are still missing Joshlin,” Yon told the Newzroom Afrika television channel after the conviction on Thursday. “It does not seem pleasant not to know where she is, what she eats or drinks and how the people who treated her.”