Voodoo Rituals Used to Create Sex Slaves in Spain

The women were recruited in Nigeria with false promises of legal employment and then illegally brought to Spain where they were forced to work as prostitutes, police said in a statement.

Police said the ring carried out "voodoo rituals and black magic to frighten the women and keep them always under control with the threat of 'destroying their souls" or 'making them crazy'."

All the money which the women earned was kept by the ring until they had paid off the debt they incurred to make the trip to Spain, which typically amounted to 50,000 euros (£44,000), police said.

Police carried out searches of 10 residences as part of their operation and seized material used in voodoo rituals, computer equipment as well as several passports and other documents.

They opened their investigation in February after receiving a complaint from a woman in the southeastern city of Seville who said she had been one of the ring's victims.

The women who were recruited by the ring in Nigeria were brought by bus and truck to Libya. From there they were taken to Italy by boat and brought overland to Spain.

Earlier this month in the Netherlands, the trial of 11 people accused of using voodoo curses to force up to 150 Nigerian girls into prostitution in Europe was adjourned until later this year.

Prosecutors alleged that between 140 and 150 Nigerian girls helped into the Netherlands as asylum seekers had disappeared from asylum centres in 2006 and 2007.

About a dozen of the girls were traced, while the rest were thought to have been forced into prostitution in Italy, Spain and France. Most were minors at the time, their ages ranging from 16 to 23.