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Society
Bettina Siegner - a pixellated photo. Photo: DPA

Two years jail for man who enslaved teen

Published: 23 Jan 13 09:56 CET | Print version
Online: http://www.thelocal.de/society/20130123-47505.html

A Bosnian court gave on Tuesday two years in jail, the minimum sentence, to a man who held a young German woman captive for more than six years, a prosecution spokesman said.

"Milenko Marinkovic pleaded guilty and he was sentenced to two years in prison" for having enslaved 19-year-old Bettina Siegner from 2005 until her rescue by police last May, local prosecution spokesman Admir Arnautovic said.

He said prosecutors planned to appeal the sentence, the minimum penalty for the crimes Marinkovic was indicted for. Marinkovic's wife, Slavojka pleaded not guilty and is yet to be charged.

The victim's mother, Christine Siegner, left her daughter with the Marinkovic couple in 2005, when she was 12. She had met the couple in Germany, where they had fled during Bosnia's 1992-1995 war. She was thought to have visited her daughter occasionally.

Bettina was rescued by police in the village of Karavlasi after being alerted by a villager who said he saw the teen being forced to eat pig food and pull a cart in which the couple were sitting.

She was found in a forest near the house where she was held, she had traces of old and fresh injuries on her body.

Milenko and Slavojka Marinkovic were arrested on May 17 and Siegner taken to a safe house in Bosnia.

The couple were indicted for illegally detaining the girl as well as for having inflicted her injuries, treating her in an inhuman way, exposing her to starvation and forcing her to do hard agricultural labour.

They also did not allow her to have any contact with other people and go to school, the indictment said.

According to investigators quoted by local press, Bettina wishes to return to Germany where her father Alfred Siegner, a pensioner who has health problems, lives. She had to stay in Bosnia until the judicial proceedings were over though.

AFP/The Local/jcw

What do you think? Leave your comment below.


Your comments about this article:

10:39 January 23, 2013 by nonicknameleft
so he stole 6 years of her life and in return he has to pay for only 2 years in prison?

Logic fail.
10:40 January 23, 2013 by jg.
Two years doesn't seem nearly enough.
10:59 January 23, 2013 by simski
Seriously, 2 years for destroying a life?
11:01 January 23, 2013 by michael4096
I don't understand the parents role...
11:32 January 23, 2013 by Steve1949
Yea, expedite him to Germany where he'll probably get 4 years instead of 2 and be released on good behavior after less than a year in jail.
12:20 January 23, 2013 by ichbines
In Germany he will probably get a 500 Euro fine and time served!
12:37 January 23, 2013 by raandy
The mother left her there when she was 12.What kind of mother would do that?I assume the same kind as the people that would make a child eat pig food and pull them in a cart. Six years of her life gone.The court which sentenced the abusers and the abusers both are unfeeling and uncaring people.

Six years for the couple, and wages for the incarceration period for the girl are more than reasonable. These are the kind of people that society could do without.
13:45 January 23, 2013 by freechoice
not every parent can be the Liam Neeson in Taken. who goes around shooting anyone stopping him to find his daughter.
14:48 January 23, 2013 by MattyB
12:20 January 23, 2013 by ichbines

&

11:32 January 23, 2013 by Steve1949

I was thinking the same thing. Aren't we SO Progressive.....
09:19 January 24, 2013 by wenddiver
I own a winter residence in Missisippi and one in Florida. In Mississippi the man would have gotten life and had to hoe potatoes and work in cotton fields in the Mississippi sun. I am sure he would have wished he was dead after a short period. Not very progressive, but most perverts choose to live elsewhere.We are softees in Florida. In Florida he would get between 25 to 50 years and get to serve part of it on a chain gang.
11:59 January 25, 2013 by Firmino
This is ridiculous! 2 years for imprisioning someone for 6???
14:35 January 25, 2013 by setessmer
absolutely absurd and ridiculous. He should be sent away for the same amount of years he enslaved her for and be forced to pay her a decent amount of compensation.
09:04 January 26, 2013 by StaceyP
2 years!! I know they are appealing but what kind of court gave a 2 year sentence, not just for imprisoning and abusing someone but for doing it to a child!! I am utterly horrified! And what about the mother? Did she know these people? Or was she sick or possibly very young herself??

The poor child/ young woman will need some serious counselling for what has been done to her. I hope she finds a happy place with her grandfather....
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