Seven-year RI to Peats, McBride
Sandesh Prabhudesai
22 July 2002
Two old-age foreigner paedophiles -
Freddy Peats and Eoghan Colm McBride - were sentenced
to seven-year rigorous imprisonment each by the district
court here, for running child prostitution racket in
the coastal area here.
Peats is already undergoing a life
sentence since 1996, after his racket came to light
in 1991. The local police tried him. Subsequently, the
CBI also handled the case, chargesheeting altogether
six foreigners, including Peats.
However, only 63-year old McBride from
New Zealand could be arrested since then. Other four
- Werner Wulf Ingo (Australia), Neels Oscar Johnson
(Sweden), Raymond Varley (Bangkok), Zell Jurgen Adreas
alias Yogi (German) and Dominique Sabire (France) -
are still absconding.
Both Peats and McBride however have
been now sentenced for committing offences of criminal
conspiracy, kidnapping, abducting and selling minors
for prostitution.
In fact the whole country was shocked
when Peats' decade-long racket got exposed in 1991.
He was running an orphanage called 'Gurukul' in a village
near Colva beach in South Goa, but was actually exploiting
the destitute children sexually and also selling them
to other visiting foreigner paedophiles.
The prosecution, while producing several
witnesses including the victims, established a fact
that the children were kidnapped, subjected to sexual
abuse and causing injury to them, sold and made these
children available to foreign nationals to satisfy their
sexual lust.
The case was handed over to the CBI
as per the high court orders, after Mumbai-based child
rights activist Sheela Barse approached the court, complaining
that the local police authorities are not seriously
investigating into it.
This was proved even later as yet another
accomplice of Peats - Sabire from France - managed to
jump the bail and flee the country in 2000, after he
was arrested in Delhi in 1996, thanks to the suspiciously
negligent attitude of the local police.
This also followed another paedophile
disappearing from India - German national Brinkman Helmut
- who was arrested in yet another case after one NGO
compelled the police to act.
The government as well as the police
nowadays admit that paedophilia problem does exist in
the tourist state. But, in spite of several assurances,
the government is yet to bring a special legislation
to deal with the menace while the children here are
still being sexually harassed without any fear.
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