FORT WORTH, TEXAS — A Muslim couple has been sentenced to seven years in federal prison each for enslaving a West African girl for more than 16 years until she escaped with the help of neighbors, the U.S. Department of Justice.

Mohamed Touré and Denise Cros-Touré, who are citizens of the Islamic dominated African country of Guinea, and lawful permanent residents of the U.S., were also ordered to pay their victim $288,620.24 in restitution in the forced labor conviction, according to Yahoo news.

Prosecutors say the couple — members of “wealthy and powerful Guinean families” — arranged for the victim to travel to Texas from rural Guinea in early 2000.

Starting as a young girl, the couple forced the victim named Djena Diallo “to cook, clean, and take care of their biological children, some of whom were close in age to the victim, without pay for the next 16 years,” the release says.

The couple kept the victim from receiving an education and punished her physically and emotionally, prosecutors say. She was called a “dog,” “slave” and “worthless” by the couple.

Diallo said Toure once shaved her head because Cros-Toure didn’t like the way her hair looked.

She wasn’t allowed to use the children’s towels, and she could not mix her clothes with their laundry, according to Dallas News.

“One time, Denise said I smelled bad and she took me outside and hosed me off,” Diallo said.

Diallo said she cooked meals but was the last to eat. She said she did not attend school.

She also fixed appliances in the home and helped remodel parts of it with help from a neighbor, she said.

When she was disciplined for not doing chores right, it was usually at the hands of Cros-Toure, she said.

“She tried to choke me multiple times,” Diallo said. “She pulled my hair.”

When Cros-Toure beat her with a radio power cord, Diallo would try to block the blows with her hands and arms, she said.

According to Justice News, as a consequence of their convictions, the defendants may lose their U.S. immigration status and be removed to Guinea pursuant to law.

The sentences were announced by Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband of the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, U.S. Attorney Erin Nealy Cox of the Northern District of Texas, and Special Agent in Charge Jeffrey McGallicher of the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) Houston Field Office.

“I hope that today’s sentence brings some measure of justice and healing to the victim, who suffered untold trauma as a result of the defendants’ heinous crimes. The defendants stole her childhood and her labor for years, enriching themselves while leaving her with pain and an uncertain future,” said Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband.

Evidence at trial further established that the defendants physically, emotionally, and verbally punished the young victim when she disobeyed or otherwise failed to perform the required labor to their satisfaction.

For example, the defendants called the victim a “dog,” “slave,” and “worthless.” They repeatedly hit her on multiple occasions, including with an electrical cord.

They forced her to sleep alone in a nearby park as punishment, abused her by shaving her head and washing her outside with a hose, and rendered her completely dependent on them for everything.

They isolated her from her family and society and prevented her from receiving any education, while their own children attended school and college.

The following year, everything “went downhill,” she said.

Cros-Toure’s punishments – over such things as meals and dirty dishes – grew fiercer, she said.

“Some stuff happened that year and I had enough,” Diallo told the jury.

She said she resolved to leave for good.

With help from friends and neighbors, Diallo was picked up outside the Toure home in August 2016 and eventually taken to a former neighbor’s home in The Woodlands, a Houston suburb, where she currently lives.

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