" CHILD WITCH " TRIAL ( 2005 )

Three guilty over 'child witch' cruelty

DAILY MAIL online

 03 June 2005

Two women and a man have been found guilty at the Old Bailey of cruelty to a girl who was tortured and threatened with death for being a "witch".

The girl's 38-year-old aunt was found guilty of cruelty and a brother and sister were found guilty of aiding and abetting child cruelty.
The eight-year-old was cut with a knife, beaten with a belt and shoe and had chilli peppers rubbed in her eyes to beat the devil out of her.
And, in a final cruel twist, she was put into a zip-up laundry bag and told she would be "thrown away" into a river, the Old Bailey heard.
The orphan was beaten until she was made to admit she had been doing witchcraft and is still traumatised by the experience.
After she was terrorised in the council flat in Hackney, east London, area wardens found her shivering in bare feet on the steps.
She told them she was hungry and later told police that she had been surviving on tea and bread.
The girl, who is now 10, was brought to Britain in 2002 by her aunt after her parents were killed in Angola.
The eight-year-old girl's aunt, who cannot be named for legal reasons, and another relative, Sita Kisanga, 35, of Hackney, east London, had denied conspiracy to murder and child cruelty charges.
Kisanga's brother, Sebastian Pinto, 33, of Stoke Newington, north London, denied aiding and abetting child cruelty.
The girl told police she had been beaten and then placed in a zip-up laundry bag to be thrown into a river after being told she was a witch.
None of the defendants gave evidence in court but the women blamed each other when interviewed by police.