A South African mother and two accomplices were sentenced to life in prison Thursday for trafficking her 6-year-old daughter, in a case that shocked the country after the child went missing last year.
Kelly Smith, along with her boyfriend Jacquen Appollis and their friend Steveno Van Rhyn, were found guilty of kidnapping and trafficking Joshlin Smith, who vanished from a small town in the Western Cape. She has not been found despite extensive police searches.
During the trial, a witness testified that Smith admitted selling her daughter to a sangoma, or traditional healer, for 20,000 rand (about $1,100). The girl was reportedly wanted for her “eyes and skin.”
High court judge Nathan Erasmus said Thursday that the fact the trio were drug users did not lessen their culpability.
“There is nothing that I can find that is redeeming and deserving of a lesser sentence than the harshest I can impose,” Erasmus said.
In addition to life sentences for human trafficking, the three were given 10-year prison terms for kidnapping.