No mercy for woman who sold minor girls to Chinese gang

[geovalin]

The Phnom Penh Appeal Court yesterday upheld a 15-year jail term given to 57-year-old woman who sold three minor Cambodian girls to Chinese human trafficking group in 2018. Presiding Judge Sin Visal rejected the appeal plea of convict Chim Chantha, a farmer living in Pong Toek village, Roka Pram commune, Tboung Khmum province’s Tboung Khmum district.

During yesterday’s appeal hearing, Chantha admitted committing the offence, and said that she filed the appeal to seek a reduced jail term as she was old and living with many diseases in the prison.

 

Judge Visal said that she was sentenced on May 15 this year by the Kratie Provincial Court to 15 years in prison on charges of ‘Unlawful Removal for Cross-Border Transfer’ under Article 11 of the Law on Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation.
According to Ratanakiri Provincial Police’s report, Chantha who had been recruiting girls from poor families in the pretext of helping them get married to Chinese men, persuaded three underage girls living in Kratie province’s Snuol district for marriage with Chinese men in 2018.
Chantha paid $3,000 each to the victims’ parents for marriage expenses. When the victims arrived in China, their passports were seized by the Chinese ringleaders of human trafficking group.
Later they were sold to work as masseuses at a Chinese Karaoke Club there for more than a year and the owner forced them to be prostitute without pay.
The girls managed to flee in a cab to the Cambodian Embassy, and were repatriated later to Cambodia in June 2019.

 

read more https://www.khmertimeskh.com/1185407/no-mercy-for-woman-who-sold-minor-girls-to-chinese-gang/