Crime Solicitors

A child from Pakistan was kept in a couple’s cellar and repeatedly raped for almost a decade.

Manchester Crown Court heard how the young girl was trafficked to Britain so her captors could claim £30,000 in benefits.

The young girl- now thought to be 19- entered the country in 2000 with a passport claiming that she was 20; a fact that was reportedly missed by immigration officials at Heathrow airport.

Over the course of the nine years the deaf and mute girl was held captive, she was repeatedly raped by 84 year old Ilyas Asher and forced to work for his wife Tallat, 67, at their home in Eccles, Salford.

She was held captive in the cellar of the £300,000 house and forced to carry out menial chores for the Ashers; including cooking, cleaning, sewing, washing and ironing.

Her days were spent packing football shirts, clothes and mobile phone covers, while she had no contact with children of her own age and was not allowed to attend school.

The “remarkably resilient young woman” spent 49 days reliving her horrific experiences via video link in a private room in the courtroom.

The young girl revealed, speaking through a sign language interpreter and translator:

“I was sad and weak because I was working so hard. I had to clean all the time and that was it- that was my life. I would cook and clean for hours.”

Lights in the cellar would flicker on and off to signify when her captors needed her.

“The lady got angry because I was making too much noise, but I wouldn’t know I was making noise.”

“I would be sitting there crying for hours and hours, sitting alone.”

“I was sad and weak because I was working so hard.”

“The old man, he’s bad. He’s the one who has sex with me.”

The police went to the hose in 2009 in regards to a separate matter and found the girl in the cellar.

The sign language that she had been taught over months by experts led to Asher’s conviction after she signed her evidence to a jury in a series of long court sittings.

Ilyas Asharwas was convicted of 13 counts of rape, and he and his wife Tallat were convicted at an earlier trial of trafficking, exploitation and benefit fraud; while his daughter, Faaiza, was also convicted of ,a href="https://www.duncanlewis.co.uk/crime_fraud.html#6">benefit fraud.