have no shop and then t<strong>here</strong> is no possibility to work <strong>here</strong>, you won’t earnanything, and then they will not take you, you have to join the girls to work on thestreet. «What!?!» «Oh yes dear, this is the work that we do <strong>here</strong>»” (InterviewVictim No.3).The women are instructed on how to behave with the clients and accompaniedto the position by the madam or by the other girls. The madam shows them thebank notes and explains the value of each one. She recommends acceptingexclusively Italian clients, avoiding Albanians and Moroccans, considered to be toodangerous. She gives a glove, handkerchiefs and prophylactics, she makes the girldress with “work dresses” and she sends her together with the others, that have thejob of teaching the work, on the street.“At night she came to show me «This is 5 Euros, this is 10...» and she hadbought me clothes. But it was cold and I asked «how is it possible that I put onthese small clothes?»” (Interview Victim No.12).“They gave me a glove, they gave me handkerchiefs, they gave me a miniskirt toput on, they gave me boots because I was cold ” (Interview Victim No.2).The first period is recalled as the worst: many women tell how they cried fordays, even at work, not even managing to get one client. This behaviour makestheir position worse and, once returning to the house without money they arethreatened and hit.This phase overcome t<strong>here</strong> begins a tight rhythm of work, which finds manywomen engaged day and night for the complete restitution of the debt.Living and working conditionsThe majority of the women live heaped up in small lodgings or grouped in oneroom.“In the house I lived in we were 13, with me 14. In one room.” (InterviewVictim No.10).“It was a mini-apartment, room and kitchen and t<strong>here</strong> were two beds in thekitchen” (Interview Victim No. 8).“I was in the house with 7 girls, two rooms and a kitchen. Including her (themadam) we were 8, when I arrived 9” (Interview victim No.5).T<strong>here</strong> are also cases in which the victim lives alone with the madam and hercompanion or her husband. This is in cases in which the madam is at her firstexperience, so she has not yet enough money to buy many girls or lodging,sometimes in another city, in which the so-called controller can manage on herbehalf, a group of women. In this case the choice is that keeping one woman withher may depend on the necessity for greater control of the victim in question, orother reasons of a practical nature.“She did not have girls in the house, t<strong>here</strong> was only me and they gave me aroom w<strong>here</strong> t<strong>here</strong> was only a bed. On the Castilian however t<strong>here</strong> was a very bighouse, 4 rooms and t<strong>here</strong> lived 15 girls ” (Interview Victim No.5).
For the woman interviewed the reason for the different treatment was in the factthat she had arrived from Nigeria in an advanced state of pregnancy. If in the firstmoments this was the reason for an excited contrast between the madam and whohad sold the woman, successively the birth of a child represented an instrument ofblackmail of the woman, obliged to prostitute herself not only to pay the debt, butto be able to keep the child with her. The madam in this case managed the child asif it were hers, being at the same time the baby sitter and jailer. In spite of the factthat she was perhaps very attached to the child, she used the child as a blackmailweapon controlling the times and ways of meeting the mother and threatening tosell the child every time she did not behave according to the rules imposed.T<strong>here</strong> are also cases of women who lived in lodgings on their own, without thepresence of persons officially in charge of control. As we will see, this way, even ifgiving the illusion of more liberty, hides the more shifty control mechanism, basedon competition within the group of girls.The lodging is used during the day to sleep or watch TV for those who work atnight, while those who work both at night and day spend few hours. Only in onecase the house was also a place of work, being positioned in the neighbourhood ofthe place of work of the woman interviewed.T<strong>here</strong> are not infrequent changes of lodging due to the buying and selling of thevictims from one to another, or to the incompatibility of character between themadam and the girl or following incursions of the police in the original lodging.“When I saw that my money was not so much to give I started to respond. Oneday she threw my things out [of the house, Ed.] (…) my boyfriend found me ahouse, but I still owed money that I should give ” (Interview Victim No.2).“In the end she said «I don’t want one with her eyes so open, I want my moneyback». I went a second time to Genoa and they sold me another time to Verona”(Interview Victim No.4).“I was in Naples, I worked for a year and then t<strong>here</strong> was a lot of troublebetween me and her and she sent me to her friend <strong>here</strong> (in Veneto)” (InterviewVictim No.8).“Then t<strong>here</strong> were problems of police and the house was full, she put me inanother house, always in Turin” (Interview Victim No.12).The transfer of the girls is not necessarily connected to personal difficulties.The operators often talk about a turnover of the victims not only in neighbouringplaces, but also on Italian territory, with an exchange of the girls between two ormore madams. Two main explanations emerged during the interviews. The firstreason was the fear that the girl could escape the logic of the pact: often the transferis the consequence of a too tight relationship created between the victim and aclient, or connected to the perception that the girl is acquiring excessive margins ofautonomy. The second reason calls upon the logic of rationalising theorganisational network: the need to optimise in economic terms the exploitation ofthe victim, placing her in areas w<strong>here</strong> the market is the most florid 33 .33Data which suggests the existence of a very well organised network, very well structured. We willreturn to this point in the following Chapter.
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TRAFFICKINGOF NIGERIAN GIRLSTO ITAL
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F O R E W O R D1. Objectives and st
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and who have identified the most si
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on the other hand, for those involv
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Case files analysed: Preventive det
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Table 2 - Socio-economic situation
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Table 3 - Nigerian citizens regular
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Table 5 - Social protection permiss
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Table 7 - Number of persons charged
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In the case of the girls having mor
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As has been many times noted, the c
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under the profile of the “quality
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person to obtain either relevant re
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Numerous are the criminal juridical
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If the accused claims to not knowin
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sanctions, sometimes, also in prese
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d) Investigative and judiciary co-o
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The reform foresees, under Art. 1,
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which the woman can definitively tu
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witnesses, social operators - agree
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and necessary, therefore, to think
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in many cases they are driven to th
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Melossi, D., (2002), “Le teorie s