A mother sold her six-year-old daughter to a ‘healer’ for just £800 in South Africa.
Racquel ‘Kelly’ Smith, 35, was convicted of kidnapping and trafficking along with her boyfriend Jacquen Appollis and their friend Steveno van Rhyn.
Little Joshlin Smith, who has a fair complexion and turquoise eyes, disappeared last February after vanishing outside her home in Saldanha Bay, near Cape Town – and has not been seen since.
A court heard during the six-week trial how Smith was sought out by a ‘healer’ for her ‘light eyes and skin’, with the mother reportedly only receiving around £800 for her.
‘On the human trafficking charge, you are sentenced to life imprisonment. On the kidnapping charge, you are sentenced to 10 years imprisonment,’ Judge Nathan Erasmus told the trio.
Joshlin’s grandmother, who now cares for her daughter’s eldest child, pleaded with Smith ahead of the sentence to ‘bring my [grand]child back or tell me where she is’.
In the days before Joshlin disappeared, the mother confessed to her that she had sold her child to a ‘sangoma’ – a traditional healer.
Ms Lombaard said she later saw Smith pack some of Joshlin’s clothing into a black bag, which she was carrying when she met a woman she believes was the sangoma.
Smith climbed into a white car with Joshlin and the sangoma and they drove away, according to Lombaard.
One of Joshlin’s teachers said Smith told them during one of the searches for Joshlin that she was already ‘on a ship, inside a container, and they were on the way to West Africa’.
