On Wednesday, the Gauteng High Court found Ediozi Odi, a Nigerian national, guilty of human trafficking and sentenced him to the ultimate maximum sentence allowed -- six life terms and an additional 129 years.
Based on information documented by Zelda Venter, an IOL News journalist that has covered the case extensively, Ediozi Odi is a Nigerian national who operated a brothel in Springs, a metro in the east side of Ekurhuleni, South Africa.
There is not much else to know about Odi. He ran a s-x dungeon that was masqueraded as general store slash barbershop.
He and his co-accused, Nomsa Hlalele and Luke Botha faced 20+ charges related to human trafficking and other sx crimes for their direct involvement in using three girls, aged between 13 and 14, as s-x slaves.
During the trial, which was close-off to the public due to its personal nature and the fact that the victims who were also witnesses -- were still considered minors, the court heard testimony on how Odi’s mules, Hlalele and Botha were instrumental in luring the three girls.
It’s believed that they targeted girls from poor, impoverished communities, with a promise of a better life and an opportunity to work their way out of poverty.
However, once they were placed in the clutches of Odi, they soon realised the true extent of the horrific nightmare they had gotten themselves in.
The court, chaired by Judge Natvarlil Ranchod, heard that Odi used crack cocaine -- that he peddled in his house of horrors -- to turn the girls into drug addicts and dangled it as a prize for their cooperation in selling their bodies to men who visited the brothel.
Fortunately, two of the girls who had been held hostage in the brothel found a way to escape and they alerted the police who led an operation to rescue the third girl.
While the state of the three girls has yet to be revealed, Judge Natvarlil Ranchod could not hold back his disstate for the heinous crimes Odi committed.
He gave the Nigerian national the harshest sentence possible -- six life terms with an additional 129 years behind bars.
