Two boys selling on the streets of downtown Kingston. - Norman Grindley/ Deputy Chief Photographer
LAST YEAR, the Bridgeport police, in Portmore, St. Catherine, held two teenage girls who were employed as dancers at an exotic nightclub on the Port Henderson Road in Portmore.
The police were investigating allegations that underage girls were involved in live sex acts onstage at the club. One of the girls who was 16 years old, was the mother of a six-month-old baby, who she had left with her grandmother in a rural parish. She said she became pregnant after she was raped. The police claimed the other girl, who was 15, was one of the dancers at the club who engaged in live sex onstage. An adult male, one of the persons held during the sting operation, was alleged to be the person who also participated in the live sex acts onstage with the 15-year-old and other girls.
TALE OF NEGLECT
Marie, the mother of the 15- year-old, who turned up at the police station to claim her teenage daughter, had her own heartbreaking tale of neglect and abuse. She explained that she lived with her father and stepmother until she was five years old. At age five, her step mother held one of her little hands
over the flames of a lit stove as punishment for drinking porridge without her permission. Marie said a neighbour reported the abuse and after investigations by social workers, she was sent to a place of safety. She was shunted between state and foster homes for a number of years during which she suffered various forms of abuse.
She ran way from one of the state homes and returned home to her father at 12 until one morning she awoke to find her father raping her. She ran way again from home for the last time and never went back.
Marie also has a five-year-old boy. Although she had turned up to claim her daughter, she told the police that they could not release her into her custody as she had no home to take her to. She was 'kotching' with a friend, as she had had nowhere permanent to live for quite some time.
"If them give har to mi, she a go go back a di go-go club cause mi no have nowhere fi keep har," she explained.But she believed the other option, to place her in a state home, would only be a temporary solution.
"Even if dem put har in a home, she ago run whey again. Every time dem put har in deh, she run whey. A one home she did inna when she run whey an' go 'roun a di club. Mi not even know say she neva still at di home until di police call mi this morning," she explained.
