An unemployed model has been jailed for 43 months for her role in trafficking Brazilian women to London and forcing them to work as prostitutes.
One of the women suffered a miscarriage and another contracted syphilis as a result of the work.
The court heard the women were told hidden cameras had been installed and footage of them having sex would be put up online if they disobeyed Shana Stanley, 28.
Stanley and Hussain Edani, 29, pleaded guilty on the sixth day of their trial for a number of trafficking and prostitution offences after a trial at Harrow Crown Court.
On Friday, 27 August, Stanley was jailed for 43 months and Edani for 98 months.
Hussain Edani and Shana Stanley, who were convicted of trafficking Brazilian prostitutes in London
© Photo : Metropolitan Police
Their arrest followed a series of raids on properties in north west London being used by sex workers.
Three Brazilian women were trafficked to the UK and forced to work in brothels and a fourth women, who was British, was tricked into sex work after meeting Stanley, who posed as a modelling agent.
Judge Vanessa Francis told Edani he was the "controlling mind" behind the operation, preyed on vulnerable women and made "promises of a better life."
Sought Out Women in Brazil's Favelas
Prosecutor Barnaby Shaw told the court Edani’s role was to liaise with a contact in Brazil, called Andre, who sought out vulnerable women in favelas in Rio de Janeiro, who were offered well-paid but unspecified work in Britain.
Edani, who was born in Iraq, paid for their flights to Manchester and for them to be enrolled on an English course but he then moved them to London and set them up as sex workers in flats in Harrow and Wembley and ordered them to pay him and Stanley £500 a day from their prostitution earnings.
The prosecutor said the role of Stanley, who had herself been “on the periphery of the sex industry”, was to control the women on a day-to-day basis.
He said the women had their phones and passports confiscated by Stanley who monitored them by tracking devices on mobile phones which she gave them and ordered them to keep on at all times.
Hidden Cameras and Threats of Blackmail
Hidden cameras were also installed in the bedrooms of the flats and the women were told the footage would be posted online and sent to their families if they stepped out of line or tried to contact the police.
Victim impact statements written by the four women were read out.
One of the Brazilian women, Marcia, told police: “When I was working for them I felt desperate, dirty and alone. I cried all day. I felt dirty, used and exhausted. Some clients would beat me and some would force me to have anal sex.”
Marcia contracted syphilis and eventually contacted the police in London.
“When I called the police I was terrified. I thought I was going to be killed by a gang,” she said.
The police relocated her to Bradford, in northern England, for several months but while she was there she slept under the bed and was unable to eat or drink.
“I imagined dying in England, as a pauper, and being buried in a grave without my family knowing what happened to me. My hair fell out because of the stress,” added Marcia.
Another victim, Fernanda, explained why she had agreed to come to Britain in the first place.
She said she was married to a bus driver in Rio but the couple had very little money and when she was told of the possibility of working abroad she thought it was “too good an opportunity to turn down.”
Victim Became Suspicious During Lingerie Shopping Trip
Fernanda said she was flown to England but became suspicious when she met Stanley, who took her shopping for clothes.
“It was December, but instead of shopping for functional clothes she bought lingerie and dresses, which made me suspicious,” recalled Fernanda, who was forced into sex work.
She said she found the idea “disgusting” but had no other option as she had no way of paying for a flight back to Brazil.
Fernanda said her marriage has since broken down and she is divorced because her husband blamed her for what happened.
The court was told 80 percent of people in Rio lived below the poverty line and the average monthly income in one favela, Campo Grande, was US$134 a month, meaning many residents were vulnerable to the lure of better paid work abroad and were often tricked by middlemen, known as gatos.
It is understood two of the women are back in Brazil and the third is still in Britain, where she is being assessed after applying for indefinite leave to remain.