Chapter 18
Phil stared in disbelief at the girls. He shot a glance at Chileshe and then at his lawyer. They were silent. Then he looked at the girls again. None of them looked like they were above twenty years old.
"My name is Phil and am an officer at Zambia Police. I have come to talk to you," he said to the girls. None of them spoke.
Then he continued, "I am not going to arrest you. If you tell me the truth, I shall set you free right away. Right now."
He looked at the smallest in stature and asked, "What is your name?"
"Judy sir," she replied with a tremble in her voice.
"How old are you, Judy?"
"Fifteen years."
Phil shot a hard look at Chileshe and then at his lawyer. Then he said to him, "So Kabongo was right after all."
"Kabongo told you about this?" Chileshe protested.
Then Phil turned to Judy again and asked, "Why are you locked in this room?"
"They don't allow us to go out unless it is at night."
"Or if a customer comes then they get one of us," added a taller girl with long, dark natural hair.
"How much do they pay you?"
"Nothing," answered Judy.
"How did you get here? Who brought you?" Phil asked. A third girl responded, "Its madam Jane who picked me from street and introduce me to boss Kabongo. Boss Kabongo bring us here."
Phil nodded as he looked at the girls. They all seemed to have curvy and slim bodies.
"What exactly do you do here?" He asked cautiously.
Judy said, "Sleep with men."
Another added, "And dog also."
The light skinned one added, "Me they put beer bottle in my vagina for push in and out."
"Why?" Phil asked Chileshe. Chileshe remained silent. His lawyer was face fallen.
"They bring video camera and make film us doing sex," Judy added looking at the floor.
"One of our friends was forced to do sex with three men. They did it in vagina, in anus and in mouth. She cried but they don't stop. Next day she died in room," reported the light skinned girl. Phil looked at Chileshe again.
Then he said to Nawa, "Take down the details of these girls and their statements. Then release them from here. Let them go home."
The girls clapped and jumped. Then Phil said, "Girls, please dress up and go to the police car outside with bo Nawa here."
Then turning to Chileshe, Phil said, "Let's go to your office. I think you know where this is heading."
Chileshe meekly led Phil to his office at the far end of the corridor. The lawyer followed behind as did one armed cop. The receptionist went in the opposite direction. They walked in silence until they reached the office. Chileshe unlocked it and the four of them entered. Phil took the seat behind the table while the others sat on sofas opposite him.
"Why Chileshe? Mr. Lawyer, why?" began Phil sorrowfully. Then he continued, "Those are innocent lives you are destroying."
"You said Kabongo told you about this place?" Chileshe asked Phil again.
Phil did not respond. He opened the drawers on his right side and found a packet of condoms. He put that on the table. Then he found a sealed khaki envelope. He opened it and found three DVDs.
"Do you want us to watch these?" Phil asked Chileshe. There was no reply.
"I guess I know what movies are contained in them," he said turning the DVDs round. On one of the covers was Judy in the nude. He could identify the other girls too on the other covers.
There was total silence in the office.
Phil said, "Are you married Chileshe?"
There was no response.
"Are you?"
Chileshe nodded.
"Kids?"
Chileshe raisedm four fingers.
"All boys?"
"Two boys and two girls."
Phil shook his head sadly. Then he said, "You are facing a charge of murder, because a girl is reported to have died here. You are dealing in drugs at this lodge. You are running a brothel too. Not to mention production of pornographic videos. And you have imprisoned those girls."
He paused to allow that to sink in. Then he continued, "Let me simplify matters for you. With those girls giving evidence and with these video DVDs in my hands, you are in serious trouble. That's a mixture of long term as well as lifelong sentences in prison. Confirm with your lawyer."
Chileshe looked at his lawyer, who remained quiet.
Then Phil continued, "It also means you say goodbye to your businesses, your money, your friends, your relatives and to those four lovely kids of yours."
"They are not mine," Chileshe blurted out before breaking down in tears.
"You mean your kids are not yours?" Phil asked, losing track of the conversation.
"The girls in that room- they are not mine."
"Whose are they?"
"They belong to Kabongo's superiors."
"Kabongo's superiors?" Phil asked.
"Kabongo is only an agent. He runs errands for bigger guys and then gets fat commissions."
The lawyer raised his hand toward Chileshe and said, "Please, I think..."
"No," protested Chileshe, wiping tears from his eyes with a white handkerchief. "Let me spill it. I am the one going to prison for life over this. And yet the real owners remain outside enjoying."
The lawyer addressed Phil, "Officer is there any way my client can avoid prison?"
"No," replied Phil firmly.
"I shall instruct him to remain silent then. Otherwise if you are sure that he goes in no matter what, why must he talk to you? You have your proof, right?"
"Yes we do. And we shall nail him."
"Only it won't solve your problem. The real culprits that you are looking for are out there. This sex trade is bigger than you think and it continues. Those real culprits are the people you really need."
"What is your proposal?" Phil asked.
"My client hands over the real culprits and you close down the sex trade and punish them. That will obviously catch the attention of the higher authorities, perhaps even the president. Who knows what that can earn you?"
"In exchange for what?"
"You drop the charges against my client."
"That depends on the real extent to which Chileshe is involved in the crime. If he only provides premises and nothing else, I may consider slapping him with failure to report a crime. But even that is a stretch for me. Your client is an accomplice- at the very least."
"My client shall cooperate on those terms then," concluded the lawyer.
Turning to Chileshe, the lawyer said, "Tell him what you know. Everything."
Chileshe blew his nose loudly in the handkerchief. Then he said, "I was approached by Kabongo three years ago. I was running two nightclubs and three lodges. He had a multi-million dollar proposal for me. He told me that his superiors wanted a partner in the sex trade industry. He said the clients were well paying and discreet and that they needed fresh young girls with attractive bodies as well as pointed breasts. He proposed that this lodge be leased out to them for that purpose. I was to provide this lodge as a hidden brothel. Kabongo would run everything. So all the money from the prostitution going on was going into Kabongo's pockets to his bosses and I didn't get a damn penny. All I ever got paid was upfront rental payment for the lodge. That is why this place is off bounds for the public. They have booked it end to end. Which is why I am truly astonished that Kabongo, of all people, would be the one to tell you about it and say I own the business. That is a pure lie."
"We have our ways of getting information. Please continue Chileshe."
"Anyway the business started off slowly. The clients were first of all locals- big businessmen, mostly married. It went on like that until one of them introduced a Portuguese friend to the brothel. Then it opened up to foreigners, mostly Europeans and Americans. These were paying very well and business boomed.
Greed came in. One foreign client proposed that the sex acts be video recorded and then later put on
sale in Europe. He ran an illegal porn racket in his country. So the idea was incorporated. I protested and asked for a percentage of the business deals but Kasongo refused after consulting his superiors."
"Did you personally meet these superiors to discuss your interests?"
"No. Not once even. All my meetings were with Kabongo."
"Please continue. I am listening."
"So I reacted by increasing the rentals here instead. Doubled the rate. Kabongo was angry but there was nothing much he could do. His clients had known the place and they loved it. So out of duress he agreed to be paying double but also negotiated for the use of the office premises in Rhodes Park for the amount of money I was demanding as rent."
"Which premises in Rhodes Park?"
"The one in Lagos road. The one which your men broke into over the weekend at night."
"The one you earlier told me was rented out to Molly Tembo?"
Chileshe nodded. Then his lawyer added, "Obviously, my client wishes to change his earlier comment on that subject."
"Noted," said Phil.
"Can I continue?"
"Sure," replied Phil.
"About a year ago, Kabongo came to see me about another business idea. He was very excited. He told me that a big buyer in Greece had loved our videos and he was proposing that we sell the girls directly to him. He wanted black girls to be working in his brothels in Athens. So Kabongo tasked me to intensify security here and hire modelling agents to prepare them for Europe. The first batch was successfully modelled and exported to Greece in August last year. A lot of money was made. Kabongo even bought a brand new Pajero from his earnings. It arrived here on a carrier, zero mileage."
Phil nodded.
"Then," Chileshe continued. "A second batch was exported in December. Eventually we couldn't match the numbers that they wanted. They wanted twenty girls and more per batch but we could only manage ten or eleven after much stretching. We had to either step up the numbers or increase the frequency of exports."
"How were these girls going out?" Phil asked.
"Always using the Kenneth Kaunda International Airport. They always go out as students. We attach fake acceptance letters which are forwarded to us from Greece."
"Please go on."
"At some point the demand grew so we had to look for more sources of supply. Kabongo managed to convince Jane to supply girls cheaply. Jane supplied girls from her compound in Mtendere who were prostitutes already. Soon it became common knowledge in her area on what was going on. Too many girls turned up for recruitment. It was becoming a security risk. We feared that police would know. So we stopped recruiting from Jane's house. We opened up the offices in Rhode Park as a Screening Centre to filter out fake contestants. It worked.
Unfortunately at some point, Kabongo tasked Jane to convince girls at the NGO to consider the lucrative life in Europe. This resulted in a massive exodus from the program at the NGO.
Molly noticed this sudden change and started investigating the puzzle and finally found out what was happening. She confronted Jane who abruptly resigned from the NGO. The superiors were informed of the threat that Molly posed. Molly was powerful, connected and stubborn. She wasn't going to let it go. So a plan was hatched to eliminate her."
"How was this done?"
"Kabongo arranged a meeting with her pretending he wanted to negotiate and reveal everything to her. She agreed to meet him at my premises in Rhodes Park at 18 o'clock. I attended that meeting and I supplied the heroin. That's what happened."
"Who killed her?"
"We laced her drink with a sleeping pill. Once she was unconscious, we removed her suit and dressed her up in that sexy mini dress. Then we injected her with an overdose of the drug. We then waited until around 04 o'clock in the morning to dump her body in the ponds."
"How many were you in that house?"
"Just Molly, Kabongo and I."
"Who injected her with heroin?"
"Kabongo."
"And what was your role?"
"I supplied the drug and the sexy attire and then oversaw the operation. But afterwards Kabongo told me that my hands were equally dirty."
"There was a strong story going round that Molly was immoral and that she exchanged sex for contracts..."
"I came up with that story. Kabongo tasked Jane to plant it at the NGO days before she was killed."
"What was the idea?"
"The idea was to dent her image so that in case she raised the issue with the authorities, it would seem like she was doing it as revenge. After all she had no real proof apart from what Jane told her."
"What about Jane?"
"She knew too much. She was going to be eliminated sooner rather than later. And when she talked to you, it became the final straw."
"Who killed her?"
"Kabongo hired a gunman to eliminate her. While you were interrogating her at the station, the gunman was deployed to pose as a sex client. The only reason the plan worked was that as police you did not escort Jane to her house. You stopped at a distance and started romancing with that nice female cop. Had you accompanied her to the house, the gunman would have excused himself and left. Had you insisted on searching him you would have found the gun. You would also have found out what was going on much earlier."
Phil nodded and then said, "So Molly was murdered because she discovered your international sex trade."
"Precisely."
Phil stood up to leave. Then the lawyer asked, "What is the conclusion now? You know the full story."
Phil shrugged and then said, "The story sounds true. I agree."
"It is true. I swear," protested Chileshe.
"Well except I still don't know who I am dealing with. I cannot close this case unless I arrest someone. The only person I can arrest is the one with whom there is proof of crime. Unfortunately that is you Chileshe."
"Is there another way we can look at resolving this issue without the hassle and tussle of trial? That may take years to conclude. So many things may change," said the lawyer.
"Be specific with what you mean," responded Phil.
"Well," said the lawyer looking at the armed cop standing by the door and then back at Phil. "We are all men in this office. We all know what has happened. My proposal is that we discuss as men and find an agreeable end to this issue here. At the end we should find a way so that there will be no need to take this matter beyond the four walls of this office."
"Money?"
"My client is open to settling this with both of you in this room plus your men waiting outside. Simply tell us what you want. Name the price."
"I know you have the money, but what good will it be if justice is not served? Molly will have died in vain. And so will have Jane, and the two men that Kabongo bashed to death in Garden. What about my officer who was killed at the hospital? Or the girl that died here? That is too much blood. We are not dealing with a minor traffic offense here. Not every African cop is after money. Some of us are loyal to the cause of justice," explained Phil.
"You want the big fish?" Chileshe asked.
Phil nodded.
"Then I have a plan."