Subject: [Stop-traffic] News/India: Child pornography duo
From: Melanie Orhant (morhant@igc.org)
Date: Wed Jan 31 2001 - 09:18:57 EST
The Straits Times Interactive (Singapore)
December 26, 2000
http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/story/0,1870,12979-977867940,00.html?
Child porn duo nabbed
BOMBAY - A middle-aged Swiss couple
who lured slum children in India
with expensive gifts and toys before
photographing them in pornographic
acts, is believed to be part of a
bigger racket operating across India,
Thailand and Sri Lanka.
It is a case which Swiss authorities
say will have ramifications for
international travellers, The Asian
Age reported.
The Swiss husband-and-wife team of
Wilhelm Albin Marty, 59 and his
56-year-old wife Loshiar Mary Lily
Marty, arrested last Sunday in
Bombay, will be held in custody until Dec 30.
During the Sunday raid by the Social
Service Branch of the Bombay
police, the middle-aged couple were
found with two slum children. All four
were naked.
They explained their nudity by saying
that they were having a bath 'due to
the hot weather'.
The police also recovered a laptop
with pornographic photographs during
the raid.
According to police, the
couple would lure street children
with food and gifts, and
would film and photograph them
doing pornographic acts.
The pornographic
material would then be sold abroad,
especially to websites.
Police sources also told
The Asian Age that the couple's
daughter, nephew and
uncle are also actively involved in
the racket.
The Martys' daughter is supposed to
be in her mid-30s, while their nephew
in his 40s.
According to commissioner of police
M.N. Singh, Bombay police have
seized the couple's passports and
have evidence that the couple were also
operating in other countries.
Investigations have revealed that the
Swiss couple would send money to
the children in India, but this
usually ended up in middlemen's pockets,
indicating the involvement of many more people.
Meanwhile, the Acting Swiss
Consul-General Urs Wuest told The Asian
Age that the case will have
ramifications for international global travellers -
not only Swiss nationals, but also
travellers from other countries - as visa
procedures will become much stricter.
Revealing that the case has created
quite a stir in Switzerland, Mr Wuest
said: 'We are very concerned about
the accusations and we have also
come to know that the police has
strong evidence against the couple.'
In a separate case in Moscow last
week, Russian police, working with
British and American colleagues,
arrested two suspects accused of selling
child pornography over the Internet
in Europe and the United States.
One suspect was arrested on Wednesday
in a Moscow apartment, while
the other was nabbed simultaneously
in a military hospital in St Petersburg.
Both were unemployed men, aged 30 and 28.
Police seized 588 video cassettes,
112 video discs and over 1,000
photographs of pornography, some of
it involving children. The suspects
were accused of selling the material
over the Internet and through the post.
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