A Filipino teenager was forced to come to Hong Kong to work as a prostitute in a Mongkok brothel, a court heard yesterday.
Juliet Ochado, 19, arrived in the SAR in March.
The month before, she had met in Cebu City a member of a prostitution syndicate, Maricel Cecilio, 28, who had promised her unspecified work, prosecutor Winsome Chan told the District Court.
When Ms Ochado had arrived in Manila, she was held at a hotel and told the work in Hong Kong involved prostitution, the court heard.
She then allegedly signed sham marriage papers with Hong Kong resident Tang Ka-fai, 28.
Tang, Cecilio, Wu Siu-cheung, 31, and his Filipino wife, Michelle Silvano, 27, and Li Hon-on, 27, went on trial yesterday after denying bringing Ms Ochado to Hong Kong to be a prostitute.
Ms Ochado was allegedly told she would have to have sex with about 20 men a night.
