Child porn: My family is clean, says mom
2010-12-05 18:34
Pretoria - The mother of one of the children who was forced to take part in incestuous orgies filmed by a child pornography syndicate believes that family members implicated in the crime are innocent.
City Press tracked down the woman at a plot in Lusthof, north of Pretoria, where the alleged crimes took place.
Six children between the ages of four and 13 were allegedly used as actors in sex movies which were then distributed.
The police suspect that adults, including their grandfather, had sex with the children, who were also forced to have sex with one another.
All the children have been removed to different places of safety.
“My people are innocent. There is no evidence against them,” the mother said on Saturday.
The woman was the only resident on the premises who was not arrested.
On Friday she turned up at a place of safety and allegedly tried to intimidate her son’s foster parents, but the police forced her to leave.
Locked gate
“We have nothing to say,” she said from behind the locked gate of her plot.
She refused to give her name. “Go and ask the CSC (Christian Social Council) who I am.
(Other journalists) came into my house without permission.” The children were removed from the premises by the CSC.
The dilapidated house, inhabited by an army of cockroaches, allegedly served as the studio for orgies where one of the children was allegedly raped by her grandfather and other family members.
Farm workers also said that the grandfather had offered a domestic worker alcohol in exchange for sex.
Eight family members are due to appear in the Pretoria North Magistrate’s Court on Monday to face charges of possessing, manufacturing and distributing child pornography.
They are the grandfather, 58, and grandmother, 57, their sons (34 and 36), the grandfather’s brother, 61, his 42-year-old wife, their mentally disabled son, 28, and the 26-year-old wife of one of the sons.
All the members of the family indicated that they were either housewives or farmers.
Dogs got better care
City Press saw pigs, ducks, geese, about 15 dogs and several cats on the premises.
“They cared for their dogs better than they did their children,” said Elize Bezuidenhout, spokesperson for the local community policing forum, after she had visited the premises.
Provincial police spokesperson Lungelo Dlamini said yesterday the police believed they had made a “massive breakthrough”.
He said the children who were removed from the premises were identified in the pornographic material found in the house.
Dlamini also confirmed that police officers were involved in clandestine operations before the raid on the premises.
Several members of the police last night scrutinised impounded DVDs and photos.
City Press was told that the children also appeared in some of the photographs.
The police also impounded computers, but found no cameras or video cameras.
A police source said that investigators were on the trail of a suspect allegedly responsible for filming the scenes.
Dlamini said the police expected to make more arrests as the investigation into the syndicate progressed.
