Mother sentenced to life in prison for trafficking her six-year-old daughter

A mother and two accomplices have been sentenced to life imprisonment for trafficking her then-six-year-old daughter, in a case that captivated South Africa.

Kelly Smith, her boyfriend, Jacquen Appollis and their friend Steveno Van Rhyn were convicted of kidnapping and trafficking the girl, Joshlin Smith, after she disappeared from the small town of Middelpos, Saldanha Bay, in the Western Cape on February 19, 2024.

In a trial that shocked the country, a witness said Kelly Smith told her that she had sold her daughter to a sangoma, or traditional healer, for 20,000 rand ($1,100) and that the girl was desired for her "eyes and skin".

At the time, police called for “every citizen, every person” to help find her amid fears she may have been taken to a different city or even out of the country. Joshlin Smith has still not been found despite an extensive police search.

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Announcing their sentences on Thursday, high court judge Nathan Erasmus said the fact that Kelly Smith, Appollis and Van Rhyn were drug users was no excuse.

"There is nothing that I can find that is redeeming and deserving of a lesser sentence than the harshest I can impose," Erasmus said.

Smith – whose full name is Racquel Chantel Smith – won sympathy across South Africa in the early days of her daughter’s disappearance.

Neighbours joined forces to help police search for the girl in sand dunes near the impoverished settlement of shacks and small houses where they lived.

Smith claimed she left Joshlin with Appollis on the day she went missing in February 2024 and had not seen her again.

For kidnapping, the three were given 10-year jail terms.