Child pornography case: Girlfriend was under the control of ‘mysogynistic’ boyfriend

Child pornography

Cape Town — Tonia Moodley, the 25-year-old partner of alleged child pornography distributor, Darren Wilkens (34), said she did everything under the guise of his control throughout their relationship.

Wilkens was arrested on 17 January during a raid at a Midrand property, with more than 10 million images and vidoeso seized. Moodley was arrested in Houghton a week later on 25 January after she was allegedly implicated in the case.

Wilkens and Moodley made their first appearance in the Randburg Magistrate’s Court on Friday after several delays by Wilkens’ legal team to strengthen their bail applications.

The couple face several serious charges including possession and distribution of child pornography, money laundering, fraud, contravention of the Drug Traffickign Act, and the acquisation an dpossession of unlawful proceeds and stolen property, The Citizen reported.

During court proceedings, Moodley’s denied any involvement in WIlkens’ operation and said he ran things through a website called ‘Dankmegaz’.The website contains explicit images of young children and teenagers that were for sale.

The State said Moodley’s FNB Bank account received R420 000 in 2023 and another R1.2 million in 2024 for various transactions. She denied that the money was linked to criminal activities.

“Despite them doing an in-depth analysis of the bank accounts, did my client in any way derive those funds from proceeds of child pornography? It doesn’t exist,” Moodley’s legal counsel, Nigel Riley said.

Moodley accused Wilkens of controlling her throughout the entirety of their relationship, claming Wilkens was mysogynistic.

“Her bank accounts were controlled by the first applicant. She was told, ‘You spend money here, you don’t spend money there, and you transfer here’,” Riley said.

According to an affidavit read by Attorney Dian Oosthuizen, Moodley said she was currently single, while Wilkens said he was in a stable relationship with Moodley since 2022.

According to TimesLIVE, Moodley claimed that she did not live a lavish lifestyle as she was just Wilkens’ puppet and denied the allegations levelled against her and said she was just the administrator of the business. 

Moodley said in her answering affidavit that Wilken was in control of the business including its accounts. He also controlled her personal accounts, allegedly using them for his own or business purposes. She said he told her to make payment son his behalf and disputed that she received alarge amount of money for her personal use.

She said Wilken would ask her to create websites including the front page and he would subsequently take over control of the sites and do the necessary logins and passwords as well as populate them. WIlkens also changed passwords where he felt necessary and Moodley said she did not destory any evidence intentionally.

She said she could not comment on any accusation involving Wilken and that he was the controller of all the cards related. “I had no interaction with users of the various sites as it was the first accused who would introduce himself to users,” she said.

The matter was postponed to February 14 for the court to deliver judgment on the bail application.

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Compiled by Matthew Petersen

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