Friday 20 September 2013

Human trafficking case against Saudi princess dropped

Case against Saudi princess dismissed

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • District attorney says Meshael Alayban didn't hold domestic servant against her will
  • Servant also alleged that she was denied health care and that she wasn't paid as promised
  • Prosecutor: Servant did get health care, and other allegations didn't hold up
  • Alayban was arrested in California after servant went to police
(CNN) -- Prosecutors on Friday dropped human trafficking charges against a Saudi princess, saying a domestic servant living with her in Southern California was not being held against her will as previously alleged.
Meshael Alayban, 42, was charged in July after the 30-year-old woman alleged that, among other things, she wasn't free to leave Alayban's condominium in Irvine.
But an extensive investigation after Alayban's arrest determined that while the servant might have believed the allegations, the woman's movements weren't restrained and Alayban wasn't guilty, Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas told reporters outside a courtroom after a judge dismissed the case Friday morning.

"The evidence indicates very strongly at this point that the (domestic servant) was not actually the victim of human trafficking, and so this case had to be dismissed," Rackauckas said.

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