Woman, 37, ‘who tried to cast black magic spells on police and medics after hiring witch to perform genital mutilation on girl, three, had name of ex-CPS chief inside a lime in freezer in bid to CURSE her’
- Ugandan woman, 37, and Ghanaian man, 43, ‘enlisted witch to carry out FGM’
- Pair ‘told victim to tell police she fell on a cupboard while trying to get biscuits’
- In WhatsApp messages the woman tried to put a curse on police and medics
- Police found limes in
A woman tried to cast black magic spells on police and doctors after carrying out genital mutilation on a three-year-old girl, a court heard.
The 37-year-old Ugandan woman, and a Ghanaian man aged 43, allegedly enlisted a ‘witch’ to help them carry out the surgery at a filthy flat in east London.
They are accused of instructing the victim to tell police and social workers she had ‘fallen and injured herself on the door of a cupboard after she climbed on to a work surface to get biscuits.’
But the girl later told police the couple pinned her down while another woman carried out the procedure, the Old Bailey heard.
In a series of WhatsApp messages the woman also tried to put a curse on the police and medical staff.
The Old Bailey (pictured) heard how the couple ‘enlisted a ‘witch’ to help them carry out the surgery at a filthy flat in east London’
Woman had the name of Director of Public Prosecutions Alison Saunders written inside piece of fruit
The name of Alison Saunders, former Director of Public Prosecutions, was found written inside a piece of fruit
The defendant had cow’s tongues in her freezer bound with wire and nails as part of black magic curse to silence the police and witnesses, the court heard.
The prosecutor said police also found 40 limes and other fruit which when opened contained pieces of paper with names on them.
Ms Carberry said: ‘The names included the police officers involved in the case, the then Director of Public Prosecutions [Alison Saunders], both social workers and her own son.
‘These people were to ”shut up” and ”freeze their mouth” according to the spells.
‘A jar with a picture of a social worker in pepper was found hidden behind the toilet in the bathroom. Another spell was hidden under the bed of the address.’
The court hear the girl was taken to Whipps Cross Hospital in Walthamstow, east London, in a cab on August Bank Holiday Monday in 2017.
In an emergency call the woman told operators: ‘It’s a young child, she was trying to get some biscuits and she fell on the metal and its ripped her private parts. Oh my god.’
Prosecutor Caroline Carberry, QC told the court today: ‘[The victim] later told police that the man and the woman called the other woman a witch, and that they had held her while the witch cut her.
‘During those communications the woman was instructing the man to create a spell or curse involving a substance called allum which you will hear is used to silence.
‘She instructed him to ”put the police and doctors inside” a reference to including the names of the police and doctors in the spell or curse.
‘This girl sustained her injures by deliberate cutting with a sharp instrument and the injuries amounted to female genital mutilation.’
At the hospital the woman said the girl was not wearing any underwear and had landed on a metal strip in the edge of the cupboard door after climbing up to get some biscuits.
The girl was in acute pain and after she underwent surgery that night, the consultant called in the police.
He suspected she had been subjected to FGM because there was no bruising to her body and believed the injuries had been caused with a scalpel, not the edge of a cupboard.
Ms Carberry said the girl had been prompted by the couple to tell the police what had happened.
When she was shown pictures of the kitchen by police in her first interviews she said: ‘This is where I felled. I tried to get a biscuit and I fell over on the metal.’
But she then had a conversation with her foster career at her home and said the woman was a ‘bad person is going to jail.’
When she was asked what she meant the girl added: ‘She cut my privates’ and pointed to her genitals.
She later added: ‘They hold me the lady she cut me. Blood everywhere.’ I no fall down, they tell me I fall down.’
She was interviewed by the police again and said that a second woman the man and woman called a ‘witch’ had actually cut her.
The girl later told the foster carer: ‘I promised, I can’t tell anybody.’
Expert doctors also examined the girl and found her injuries were consistent with FGM, the court heard
The male defendant told police he had been in the garden when the girl said she was going to get a biscuit.
Ms Carberry said: ‘He showed the officer a photograph on this phone of a closed kitchen cupboard door with a microwave on the work surface and at the front of the microwave a packet of biscuits.
‘He told the officer he was showing her this photograph ‘as evidence.’
But when police examined the dirty kitchen they found the cupboard door was almost hanging off and would had come away if the girl had fallen on it.
Expert doctors also examined the girl and found her injuries were consistent with FGM, the court heard.
The woman said she had never heard of FGM before it was mentioned at the hospital.
The man and woman, from east London, both deny carrying out FGM and failing to protect a girl from risk of FGM.
The trial continues.
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