Human smuggler used voodoo

A woman accused of smuggling West African girls to New Jersey and forcing them to work at hair-braiding salons made her victims undergo a voodoo ritual to frighten them into believing they would go insane if they escaped, a witness testified yesterday during a federal trial in Newark.

Before leaving for America, the girls were given kola nuts to eat by a man in Togo who told them they were taking a vow of loyalty to the woman, Akouavi Kpade Afolabi, said the witness, Vida Anagblah.

"If we didn't stay with her "¦ they said we would go crazy," Anagblah said.

The 24-year-old Ghanaian immigrant's testimony came on the second day of Afolabi's trial. She is accused of running a human trafficking operation that used physical violence and psychological intimidation to enslave about 20 girls who allegedly worked without 14 hours a day without pay at hair-braiding salons in Newark and East Orange.

Afolabi's lawyer, Olubukola O. Adetula, denies the girls were not paid. He has argued that investigators have misinterpreted multiple aspects of West African culture, including the tradition of sending children abroad to learn a trade.

Adetula asked the witness if it is common to eat kola nuts in West Africa as part of a prayer on the eve of a journey.

"Yes," Anagblah said.

The witness, who still lives in New Jersey and receives assistance from a humanitarian organization, said her parents sent her away from her village in Ghana in 2000 to Lome, Togo's capital, to live and work with Afolabi, a prominent merchant.

It was in that house, authorities say, that Afolabi began to assert control over the girls. Sometimes with violence; sometimes with voodoo, prosecutors said.

Each day, Afolabi prayed in the house before a stone altar, topped with a clay statue of a man's head, Anagblah said. Sometimes she sacrificed chickens, the witness said.

[via NJ.com]