Cambodians jailed for torturing 11-year-old maid

2010-02-20
Associated Press

A Cambodian schoolteacher and her husband were sentenced to lengthy prison terms for torturing an 11-year-old girl they had purchased to be their domestic helper and held captive for more than a year, an official said Saturday.

Meas Neary, 41, was sentenced to 20 years in prison, and her husband, Va Sarouen, a 62-year-old retired Ministry of Education official, will serve 10 years behind bars, said judge Chan Madina.

Police arrested the couple in October, acting on a tip from neighbors that their young maid was being abused.

Officers found that the girl's body was covered with more than 200 wounds that the couple said they had inflicted with coat hangers, brooms, electric wires, and sometimes used pliers to pull her flesh, police said at the time.

The Phnom Penh Municipal court convicted the couple on Friday on charges of torture and human trafficking. Each had faced a maximum of 25 years in prison.

The couple had paid $400 to the girl's 62-year-old guardian in early 2008 for the girl to help with domestic chores, authorities said. Both of the child's parents were deceased.

Desperately poor Cambodia has been working to crack down on the buying and selling of children for domestic work, brothels or street-begging rings inside and outside the country.

The court also sentenced the girl's former guardian, Thoeng Reth, to five years in prison for human trafficking, the judge said.

All three were also ordered to pay a combined 20 million riel ($2,000) in compensation to the victim. The girl, who was not identified, is now in the care of a Swiss-based Christian organization, Hagar International, which provides assistance to victims of trafficking and exploitation.

Couple held for torturing girl

Oct 19, 2009
AP

PHNOM PENH - A CAMBODIAN schoolteacher and her husband have been charged for repeatedly torturing an 11-year-old girl they bought to be their domestic helper and held captive for more than a year, a court official said on Monday.

Prosecutor Heung Bunchea said Meas Neary, a high school teacher in Phnom Penh, and her husband, Va Sarouen, a retired Ministry of Education official, were charged with torture and human trafficking in Phnom Penh Municipal Court. If convicted, they could face 25 years in prison, he said.

Acting on a tip from the couple's neighbors, police arrested them Friday while they were fleeing in a car with the girl, said Major Mok Hong, of the Sen Sok district.

The girl's body was covered with more than 200 wounds, which were allegedly inflicted by the suspects, he said, adding: 'The couple said that they beat the girl with coat hangers, brooms, electric wires, and sometimes used pliers to pull her flesh.'

The couple paid US$400 (S$557) to the girl's 62-year-old guardian in early 2008 for the girl to help with domestic chores, Mok Hong said, adding that the girl's parents were both deceased.

Mr Heung Bunchea said the girl's former guardian, Thoeng Reth, was also charged with human trafficking for selling the girl to the couple.

Some Children Labor, Far From Home

By Pich Samnang, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
21 November 2008

Pale-faced and thin, Chhim Mao sits outside a three-story building in Phnom Penh, guarding cars. Born in Takeo province, the 16-year-old boy has been living for four years with the building owner, a man he’d never known before.

“My grandmother brought me here to help with her housecleaning,” Chhim Mao says. “I help her clean the rooms, and I guard the parked vehicles, as she is getting old and has a lot of work to do.”

In fact, Chhim Mao’s grandmother no longer stays here. She has moved to another house, leaving all her tasks to Chhim Mao. The young boy waters the flowers and the plants. He cleans the stairs. He opens the gate for residents and workers. Often, he dares not sleep until late at night, waiting for the building owner to return.

“I wait for him until one o’clock, when he comes home,” the boy says. “If he has not come, I have to wait for him.”

Chhim Mao is one of more than 20,000 children who leave their hometowns to work in other people's houses in major urban centers like Phnom Penh, Battambang, Kampong Cham and Siem Reap, according to research compiled by World Vision Cambodia and Licadho.

“Some of them are also at high risk of being sexually harassed or even abused by male employers or house owners because of a lack of protection,” says Lor Monirith, World Vision’s manager for the a project to combat child labor.

Children working in private homes like this, often with long hours, lose an opportunity for education, he says.

According to a study by the International Labor Organization, child servants like these work between 12 hours to 18 hours a day, often with little or no pay. They wash dishes and clothes, iron, polish shoes, cook, look after children, care for the infirm. They are the first to rise, the last to sleep and serve at the bidding of their employer. Some are beaten, some scolded, and some are asked to take the wife’s place in the bed of the boss.

Poverty drives the children to the work, Lor Monith says.

“Some parents send their children to work here in the city to earn some money to support the family or pay back debts,” he says.

According to the International Labor Organization’s Convention on the Prevention and Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor, the government, as a signatory, must eliminate severe child labor, such as slavery, forced labor or any work affecting a child’s health, safety or morality.

Labor Ministry officials were unavailable or declined to comment.

Licadho spokesman Vann Sophat says his organization has received six cases of domestic child labor abuse this year, but not a single case has been heard by the courts.

“One of the cases was rape, but the perpetrator is walking free,” he says.

A specific law on child domestic workers is needed to protect these child servants, he says. But more than that, parents must understand that it is not a child’s duty to support the family.

“What a child needs to do,” he says, “is go to school and gain knowledge to become a well-educated citizen for the country in the future.”