Johannesburg - Hand in hand, the two broken women walked into the Pretoria High Court. Hours later, they exited with their heads held high.
One, a former teenage sex slave, the other, her rescuer, were in courtroom 4B on the fourth floor to hear the ruling that would exonerate Annari du Plessis, the founder of the NGO, Crossroads from a earlier conviction of defeating the administration of justice.
With the announcement of the ruling *Thabang burst into tears.
“I told her, ‘You can cry. You don’t have to be strong any more,’” says Du Plessis.
“While she was groomed to be a sex slave she was raped so often, sometimes gang-raped by six or more men at a time. She learned to cope with the pain, with the shame and the guilt.”
But now after three years Du Plessis has finally cleared her name.
“Thabang felt she was the reason for my arrest and that breaks my heart. I would have done it over and over again because of the way the police hurt her and subjected her to further abuse.”
Everything happened in early August 2011 when Du Plessis walked to a derelict house across the road from Crossroads in Vanderbijlpark and rescued Thabang, then 13.
She was not the first child the community worker had saved.
Thabang told Du Plessis a harrowing tale: her uncle’s girlfriend allegedly sold her to Nigerians who raped her and traded her to men in the Vaal and Free State. In Vanderbijlpark, she was prostituted by a pimp for drugs.
Du Plessis arranged for Thabang be taken to a place of safety with the police’s knowledge.
But shortly after, a contingent of heavily armed police officers arrived at the Crossroads Church and arrested Du Plessis.
They detained her and later charged her with defeating the administration of justice. While she was detained, the police brought Thabang to the cells to “display” Du Plessis behind bars.
“It was to further demean me,” says Du Plessis.
The authorities had a “personal vendetta”, says Du Plessis, who maintains that officers from the local police unit worked together to “frame me for their own incompetence”.
Her legal team had to petition the High Court for permission to appeal her earlier conviction and sentence imposed by a Vanderbijlpark magistrate last year.
For Du Plessis, a former police officer, it’s been a three-year battle to restore her dignity. It almost cost her her marriage, she says.
This week, the High Court overruled the conviction and sentencing imposed last year by the Vanderbijlpark magistrate, who slapped Du Plessis with a R12 000 fine or 18 months’ jail time, suspended for five years.
Judge Ephraim Makgoba deemed the police contact highly irregular, which he stated could have been done to break Du Plessis spiritually and morally.
“It’s clear that the appellant’s intention was at all times to protect and serve the best interests of the minor child who was a victim of crime. She did not perform any act or omission constituting and resulting in the defeat of the administration of justice.”
Makgoba stated throughout the three days leading to Du Plessis’s arrest police knew where the victim was and had unrestricted access to Crossroads.
It also emerged in court that police officers wanted to take Thabang “to church to drive the demons out of her”.
With the court ruling, Du Plessis’s load is lighter but she knows there’s still work to be done.
“I think many people in the community are so scared to help other children because of what happened to me. The integrity of Crossroads was brutally attacked … the lies that were spread about me by the police and in court were demeaning. I feel like I failed the community because of this suspended sentence was hanging over my head.”
The perpetrators of Thabang’s rape have never been brought to justice.
Both Du Plessis and Thabang are emotionally drained. For Thabang, who is now 17, the future remains unclear. Her family relationship is messy and the justice system has failed her again.
“She is supposed to be in a place of safety but she was raped last year by the 21-year-old son of a foster parent. She ran away. We reported it but the police did nothing,” says Du Plessis.
Thabang is painfully shy. “I’m relieved all this is over,” she says, simply. “I feel so tired. Annari is a good woman who helped me a lot. I’m trying to put everything behind me now.”
Du Plessis says she and Thabang will consider instituting criminal charges against the police. More importantly she still dreams of ending human slavery in Vanderbijlpark.
“The prostitution of young girls in Vanderbijlpark is even worse now,” she says.
* Not her real name
- Saturday Star