UK police: 3 women held for 30 years

[Xipe Totec]

Source: LONDON (AP)

LONDON (AP) — London police say three women were held for at least 30 years against their will in a south London home.

Metropolitan Police revealed Thursday the women had been rescued and announced the arrests of two people as part of an investigation into slavery and domestic servitude.

The investigation was launched after one of the women contacted a charity, which then went to the police. Those freed are a 69-year-old Malaysian woman, a 57-year-old Irish woman and a 30-year-old British woman.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/uk-police-3-women-held-30-years-163629713.html

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No words.

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. A police spokesperson just confirmed that means the 30 year old was there from birth

Update: the 3 are not related to each other:

A Malaysian woman, 69, an Irish woman, 57, and a British woman, 30, were all rescued from the house.

The women, who are said to be "highly traumatised", are now in safe accommodation.

Police said they were not related to each other and the 30-year-old had spent her whole life in servitude.

Det Insp Kevin Hyland, from the Metropolitan Police's Human Trafficking Unit, said: "We have seen some cases when people have been held for ten years, but we have never seen anything of this magnitude before."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-25040741

[dipsydoodle]

3. The offending/offensive couple who kept them captive

will themselves need putting into protective custody. This is appalling news.

[heaven05]

2. oh gee!

Nothing gives them their 30 years back. Evil people that did this to these women.

[littlewolf]

4. no words is right just no words nt

[LeftishBrit]

5. Makes me sick - and HOW was this not discovered for 30 years?

It's a bit close to home for me of course- and HORRENDOUS by any standards.

The people who did it are scum of course - but HOW did no one including the police catch on to it????

[Xipe Totec]

6. That's a very good question

It's early days into this tragedy. I hope we can learn something from it.

[Blue_Tires]

7. That's my question as well...

[cosmicone]

8. The brits invented it.

They took hundreds of thousands from India and China and took them to work as indentured servants in their African, Far Eastern, South American and Caribbean colonies after official slavery was eliminated.

There is a museum of indentured servitude in Port Louis, Mauritius called "Aaapravasi Museum" at the "Aapravasi Ghat", and it ias a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

If you ever wondered how come so many people of Indian descent are found in Fiji Islands, Hong Kong, Singapore, East and Southern Africa, West Africa, Guyana and the Caribbean, it is because the Brits took them there for free labor, promising high wages but delivering nothing.

It is ironic that the brits now have to prosecute people for the very same offenses.

[dipsydoodle]

9. That is not true.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_slavery

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indentured_servant

[cosmicone]

10. Indentured servants from Britain to the US

was a different story. BOTH sides knew what they were getting into and the indentured laborers were not conned or forced into the contract.

Almost universally, the Indian indentured servants of the British masters were conned or coerced into the deal, not knowing exactly how far they were going nor how long the "job" will last in reality. They were promised a job "in another town" and vast riches when they returned.

The so called "coolie museum" (Aapravasi Museum) in Mauritius tells it all. (Aapravasi has a better connotation that "coolie&quot

[muriel_volestrangler]

11. London 'slaves' had been in political collective with captors, police say

Two of the three women allegedly held as slaves first met male suspect through shared political ideology, says Met

Two of the three women allegedly held for 30 years as slaves had lived in a political collective with their captors, police have disclosed.

Metropolitan police commander Steve Rodhouse told reporters that two of the alleged victims met the male suspect in London through a shared political ideology and began living together in a "collective".
...
Rodhouse said police were examining the nature of the cult. "The people involved, the nature of that collective and how it operated is all subject to our investigation and we are slowly and painstakingly piecing together more information," he said.

"Somehow that collective came to an end and … somehow the women ended up continuing to live with the suspects. How this resulted in the women living in this way for over 30 years is what are seeking to establish, but we believe emotional and physical abuse has been a feature of all the victims' lives."

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/nov/23/london-slaves-political-collective-captor-police

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. London slavery case: Suspects 'former Maoist activists'

A married couple suspected of holding three women as slaves for more than 30 years are former Maoist activists Aravindan Balakrishnan and his wife Chanda, the BBC understands.

According to Marxist archives they were leading figures at the Mao Zedong Memorial Centre based in Acre Lane, Brixton, south London, in the 1970s.
...
Police said the 30-year-old woman, who is believed to have lived her entire life in servitude, had a birth certificate but no other official papers.

She is alleged to have written more than 200 impassioned letters and poems to her neighbour over an eight-year period, the Daily Mail reported.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-25084830

Even if you didn't believe your neighbour was being held against her will, and was making it all up, wouldn't you have gone to the authorities to seek psychiatric help for them, or to get her stopped for harassment if you thought it was all being done to annoy you, at some time well before 200 letters and poems?