Swindon ‘OCG’ allegedly trafficked girls to work as prostitutes in brothel

Eight people are currently standing trial charged with conspiracy to engage in human trafficking after a year-long cover investigation – codenamed Operation Supermarine.

Swindon Crown Court was told earlier this week that members of the gang would arrange flights for the girls from Romania to the UK, before travelling to the airport and picking them up. The girls would be dropped off to their ‘brothel’ in Whitehead Street, it was heard.

READ MORE: Crime gang 'set up brothel after trafficking girls to Swindon'

On some occasions, members of the OCG travelled to Romania themselves and brought girls back to the UK, prosecutor Nick Tucker said.

The eight members standing trial over the next seven weeks are:

• Priyantha Yakdehige, age 53, of Puton. He is also charged with keeping a brothel used for prostitution and money laundering.
• Cristina Olaru, age 29, of Swindon. She is also charged with controlling prostitution for gain and money laundering.
• Gigi Ciobanica, age 45, of Birmingham. He is also charged with money laundering.
• Victoria Olaru, age 25, of Swindon.
• Danut Cretu, age 27, of Croydon.
• Ionut Vulpe, age 26, of Swindon.
• Ion Stroie, age 34, of no fixed abode.
• Daniel Cobzaru, age 38, of Leyton.

Left to right, top row: Gigi Ciobanica, Priyantha Yakdehige and sisters Victoria and Cristina Olaru. Bottom row: Daniel Cobzaru, Ionut Vulpe, Danut Cretu and Ion Stroie.

Opening the Crown’s case earlier this week, Mr Tucker said that the OCG, led by Gigi Ciobanica set up profiles advertising sexual services before the girls even arrived in the UK.

The girls would be accompanied back with a male member, and picked up from the airport, he said.

Mr Tucker took the jury through the arrival of one of these sex workers. The woman, who was present at the brothel in Whitehead Street when police conducted a welfare visit in February 2018, arrived a month earlier.

Addressing the jury, he said that she was accompanied on a flight by a male, not one of the defendants, from Romania to Luton airport.

After a flurry of phone activity roughly ten days before their arrival between Yakdehige, the landlord of numerous OCG properties, and Cristina Olaru, a sex worker who prosecutors say rose the ranks to ‘alpha female’, flights are then booked.

They are paid for by Cristina Olaru and the contact details left are Yakdehige’s, Mr Tucker said.

The day of the girl’s arrival in the UK, a profile is created advertising sexual services online, with the £170 subscription fee paid for by Cristina Olaru, the court heard.

He says that at just before 4.45pm, partners Olaru and Ciobanica leave Whitehead Street and cellsite data places them two hours later at Luton airport.

“It’s 10.47pm, the surveillance cameras capture 3 people with luggage arriving at Whitehead Street,” Mr Tucker adds.

“We say there is a plain inference to be drawn. Ciobanica and Cristina Olaru have picked up [the male and female] and take them back to Whitehead Street, a brothel.”

He said this was an example of a “mini jigsaw”, and the jurors should “put the pieces together” so “a picture emerges”.

“In very short order we see the phone number linked to that advert is in use,” he concludes.

The trial continues. The eight defendants deny all charges.