A
Nigerian gang forced women into street prostitution in Spain by burning them
with irons and using voodoo rituals, according to police.
Detectives
have arrested six Nigerian nationals - including the suspected woman ringleader
- as part of an investigation launched last year after one of the prostitutes
filed a complaint with the authorities.
"The
control exercised over women was total, involving verbal threats as well as
physical violence and various voodoo ceremonies to terrorise them," police
said in a statement.
"The
ring caused them serious injury through bites or by using an iron to cause
second-degree burns."
The
ring allegedly recruited women in Benin City, whose husbands and fathers had
died and who were struggling to raise their children.
They
transported the women overland to Morocco and then smuggled them on small
wooden boats into Spain where they were forced to work as street prostitutes in
Barcelona and Malaga.
Spanish
police have swooped several times in recent years on similar prostitution rings
that used the threat of voodoo curses to frighten their victims into obedience.
Before
leaving Nigeria, the rings often take their victims to shrines where they swear
to pay their debts to the group and not to denounce them to the police.
The
women leave fingernails, hair, underwear and other personal items at the
shrines which they are told will give voodoo priests the power to harm them
wherever they are in the world.
