|
Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery Published reports & articles [continued] gvnet.com/humantrafficking/USA.htm |
|
|
ARCHIVES [Part 4 of 4] CAUTION: The following
links have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in the
USA. Some of these links may lead to
websites that present allegations that are unsubstantiated or even
false. No attempt has been made to
validate their authenticity or to verify their content. Saudis Import Slaves to America Daniel Pipes, New York Sun, June 16, 2005 www.danielpipes.org/2687/saudis-import-slaves-to-america [accessed 13 January 2011] Last week, however,
the FBI accused the couple of enslaving an Indonesian woman who is in her
early 20s. For four years, reads the indictment, they created "a climate
of fear and intimidation through rape and other means." The slave woman
cooked, cleaned, took care of the children, and performed other tasks for
little or no pay, fearing that if she did not obey, "she would suffer
serious harm." It's shocking,
especially for a graduate student and owner of a religious bookstore - but
not particularly rare. Here are other examples of enslavement, all involving
Saudi royals or diplomats living in America. Human Trafficking Seen as Threat Within
Nation's Borders Kelli Cottrell, Baptist Press, Los Angeles,
Nov 21, 2005 www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?id=22118 [accessed 12 January 2011] bpnews.net/22118/human-trafficking-seen-as-threat-within-nations-borders-conference-attendees-told [accessed 14 October 2016] "This
summer we arrested a ring where 100 girls from Korea were being held in
forced prostitution in San Francisco," Kibble said at the conference.
"Over 1,500 trafficking victims in Los Angeles and 400 in Orange County
have been rescued in the past two years. It is evil what these people are
doing, and we in law enforcement can't do it all. We need your help. We're
all in this together." Suspect in runaway prostitute case was
child prostitute Associated Press AP, Nov 10,
2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] Butler
was similarly imprisoned by a pimp in 2003, when police said she was among
eight girls kept in a locked apartment. Butler refused to testify against
Christopher Arbuckle, 26, who was convicted of holding the girls and is
serving time in an Arizona prison. Couple guilty of
fraud, forced labor Associated Press AP, Wichita, Kansas,
November 08, 2005 heartlandvalues.blogspot.com/2005/11/couple-guilty-of-fraud-forced-labor.html [accessed 12 January 2011] www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2005/November/05_crt_599.html [accessed 3 March 2018] The
married owners of a group home for the mentally ill were convicted Monday of
enslaving its residents, forcing them to work naked and perform videotaped
sex acts. Woman Tells
Terrifying Story Of Teen Prostitution San Diego News, November 2, 2005 www.10news.com/news/5237000/detail.html [accessed 12 January 2011] Her
nightmare started in a San Jose parking lot. A woman, who 10News will call
Sarah, was 18 and walking in broad daylight when several men got out of their
car and cornered her. "The driver
said, 'I have a gun, get in the car.' I got in the car," she said. Sex trafficking hits home Emily Kaiser, The Minnesota
Daily, October 31, 2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] You
couldn't spot them on the street, but right now there are slaves living in
local neighborhoods, hidden in basements and being transported along area
highways. The CIA estimates 50,000
women and children are transported each year throughout the United States by
being conned and forced into a life of sexual exploitation. The FBI estimates
that the average age of a prostitute in the United States is 13. To stop a forced sex trade Emily Kaiser, The Minnesota
Daily, November 1, 2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] She
said she was trafficked by her family as a young girl and escaped by saving
money for college. Stark attended the University her first year and
transferred to University of Wisconsin-Madison to get away from her family. Rural
Minnesota is one of the sex trafficking pipelines to larger cities, such as
Chicago, she said. Slavery is no longer black, white Lance Cpl. R. Drew Hendricks, Marine Corps
News Room, Sep. 23, 2005 -- Story Identification #: 200592315119 www.marine-corps-news.com/2005/09/slavery_is_no_longer_black_whi.htm [accessed 12 January 2011] Due to
recent increases in the number of trafficking in persons
cases and the release of the 5th annual Trafficking in Persons Report,
President George W. Bush has required the Department of Defense to increase
its training and awareness of this crime in order to assist in its
prevention. The Marine Corps has
decided to take on this challenge in a very direct manner. “The Marine Corps will take a zero
tolerance approach to trafficking in persons…and the Marine Corps opposes all
activities that contribute to this crime,” said Gen. Michael W. Hagee,
Commandant of the Marine Corps, in All Marine Message 016/05. In light of the Corps zero tolerance stance
no Marine, Sailor or civilian Marine will ever participate in any crime
associated with trafficking in persons, no matter how small the association.
Doing so will result in severe punishment. Sexual Slavery in
Prison New York Times Editorial, October 12, 2005 [accessed 12 January 2011] A
former inmate has told jurors how corrections officers ignored his written
pleas for help, and even laughed at him, while he was repeatedly raped and
sold into sexual slavery by prisoners who viewed him as property. According to court documents, vulnerable
inmates were told to either fight it out with rapists or find boyfriends who
would protect them in return for sex. Mr. Johnson says gang members were free
to rape him, sometimes by paying a few dollars to the prisoner who in effect
"owned" him. Behind the moral
panic, an opportunity to work Carol Leigh, Open Forum, SFGate, July 22, 2005 www.sfgate.com/opinion/openforum/article/Behind-the-moral-panic-an-opportunity-to-work-2653790.php [accessed 4 September 2012] When hundreds
of federal and state agents descended on massage parlors in San Francisco
earlier this month, declaring some women sex slaves, another story was
obscured by this moral panic: This rescue operation was not necessarily in
the best interests of these women. Oversexed Debbie Nathan, Agence
Global, 12 August 2005 www.thenation.com/article/oversexed?page=full [accessed 26 August 2011] On paper the law
looks good. But in practice it hasn't helped many people so far, and it's
hurt others, while placing undue emphasis on commercial sex work and
downplaying the plight of victims in other jobs, like Alice. Probably because
she was "just" an imprisoned nanny and not a brothel captive, the
Feds declined to criminally prosecute her boss, and they hardly publicized
her case. That's often what happens with people forced to work in factories,
fields, restaurants and homes -- and there are plenty of them in the United
States. Service providers
stress that coerced sex brutalizes victims, and they're glad the government
and the media are concerned. But they wonder why other workers' suffering
gets so much less attention. The terror evoked by imprisonment in a
sweatshop, says CAST's Buck, "is just as severe as it is for a person who's sex trafficked." The Real Deal Alicia Mundy,The
Seattle Times, August 2005 [accessed 13 January 2011] The full article … www.seattletimes.com/pacific-nw-magazine/the-real-deal/ [accessed 20 January 2020] As the hound of
human traffickers, John Miller believes playing politics is not an
option. Recently, Goldberg elaborated:
"I've only interviewed about 20 million people in my time. He was
furious that he'd been lied to about this. He just came through as the real
deal." U.S. kids coerced into prostitution Annie Sweeney, Crime Reporter, Chicago
Sun-Times, August 9, 2005 www.cocoalounge.org/viewthread.php?tid=17869 [accessed 13 January 2011] ALMOST
A BRAINWASHING - "He kept all the money. He made them
believe he was keeping the money for them. The girls were not free to leave.
He kept them in horrible hotels. And moved them around. He paid for food and
clothing," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Carrie Hamilton. "It's
almost a brainwashing that takes place. It's a very complicated, horrible
relationship." Surviving
Chicago's sex slave trade Annie Sweeney, Crime Reporter, Chicago
Sun-Times, August 7, 2005 www.ipsn.org/organized_crime/prostitution/surviving_chicago.htm [accessed 13 January 2011] A
GUN TO THE HEAD -
Mishulovich and the others had no intention of ever
letting the debt get paid down, authorities said. On a good night, Z would
earn $500. And just about all of it went to the crew, who also checked her belongings
at the end of the night, looking for hidden cash. Captive Workforce (American Samoa) [PDF] Michelle Chen, The New Standard, July 5,
2005 www.ncdsv.org/images/SlaverySlipsThroughCracksUSPolicyPt1.pdf [accessed 13 January 2011] [page 7] Around nine
o’clock, the guards would shut the gates of the factory compound, preventing
employees from escaping. But the fences were only an extra precaution;
starvation, threats and beatings had sapped many of even the hope of ever
leaving. Modern Slavery Jorge Mújica Murias, La Raza, 06-10-2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 13 September 2011] A
HIDDEN PROBLEM
- Regarding this phenomenon, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) declared
that in 2004 it detected sixteen thousand undocumented Mexicans and Central
Americans subjected to sex and labor slavery in the United States. U.S. Agents Raid
Fla. Migrant Labor Camp Associated Press AP, East Palatka FL, 5 Jun
2005 www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1417000/posts [accessed 13 January 2011] Officials said
homeless people were recruited to the Evans Labor Camp through offers of room
and board, along with alcohol, tobacco and drugs, which they bought on
credit. But they never made enough in the field to pay it off, according to
an investigative summary. "A lot
of times, they get them indebted even before they get back to the camp," Human trafficking goes on in U.S., too David Crary,
Associated Press AP, Los Angeles, November 01, 2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] On Jan. 1, 2002,
she worked her first shift at the dressmaker’s; sewing roughly 200 party
dresses over 12 hours. Later, the
shifts often stretched to 17 hours a day. Molina was locked into the shop at
night - sleeping with a co-worker in a small storage room. The shop manager
paid Molina roughly $100 a week, confiscated her identity documents, and told
her she would be arrested if she went to the authorities. "For me, it was completely dark,
without money, without English, no papers, nothing," Molina said in an
interview. 10 Charged in International Human Smuggling
Ring Newark, July 21, 2005 officialcoldcaseinvestigations.com/showthread.php?p=7771 [accessed 19 June 2013] chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=57027 [accessed 3 March 2018] The women, mostly
from rural, poor villages in Honduras – some as young as 14 – were recruited under
the false promise of getting legitimate jobs as waitresses in restaurants in
New Jersey. Once brought to Hudson County by way of a safe house in Houston,
Texas, however, they were put to work at several bars owned by the ringleader
and subject to physical and emotional abuse, according to the Indictment. Sex Slaves Revisited Jack Shafer, editor at large, Slate, June
7, 2005 [accessed 13 January 2011] To be sure, sex slavery
in the United States is real and horrific, but the body count remains
anybody's guess, and that includes the U.S. government. A Modern Slave Trade John R. Miller, Director of the Office to
Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, Op-Ed, New York Post Online
Edition, May 22, 2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] Consider recent
trafficking cases right here in America.
In April, three Mexican defendants pled guilty to 27 counts of running
a sex-trafficking ring between Mexican villages and New York City. Between
1991 and 2004, the Carreto family smuggled dozens
of young, poor women into the U.S., promising them jobs and better lives,
selling them the American dream. Instead, they sold them into sexual slavery
and only the Carreto family profited. Earlier this
spring, a New Jersey man was sentenced to prison for luring Russian women
into the U.S. as "cultural dancers." The women ended up being
forced to work in New Jersey strip clubs. Noncompliance meant a severe
beating or worse. American women and
girls are victims of sex trafficking too. In February of this year, a father-son
team in Kansas pled guilty to trafficking girls ages 13 to 16 into
prostitution by luring them with false promises of out-of-town day trips. NY State Wants to Make Human Trafficking a
Felony Filipino Reporter, News Report, Albany NY,
May 30, 2005 news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=18eac6f2c9a24fe76a0812b5554d6890 [accessed 26 August 2011] www.ice.gov/news/releases/wisconsin-couple-who-kept-modern-day-slave-19-years-deported-philippines [accessed 3 March 2018] Last March, a
Filipino-American Wisconsin couple — both physicians — was indicted for human
trafficking for holding a Filipina as a domestic servant in their home for 19
years by threatening her with deportation, imprisonment and physical
restraint. Last fall, a 60-year-old
Filipino woman in California won an $825,000 lawsuit after claiming she was
enslaved and assaulted, working 18 hours a day, and sleeping in a dog bed. The new face of slave trade in Houston? June 03, 2005 www.khou.com/news/local/houstonmetro/stories/khou050526_jt_slavetrade.2b139287e.html [Last access date unavailable] He says the girls
working at most Asian and Oriental spas were smuggled here against their
will. "They don't let 'em out the doors. They don't get breaks. They can't leave
and go shopping," says David. Three Arrested in Connection with
Prostitution Case WTOL-11 News, Toledo, May 25, 2005 www.wtol.com/Global/story.asp?S=3386434 [accessed 13 January 2011] www.wtol.com/story/3386434/three-arrested-in-connection-with-prostitution-case/ [accessed 17 February 2019] Two Toledo teens
are back home safe after police say they were abducted while walking in East
Toledo and forced into prostitution. "We'll be right back." That's
what the two teenage cousins told their parents. When they didn't return from
a walk, their parents thought they had run away. It wasn't until Monday, they
learned what had happened. Human trafficking initiative advances in
eastern Missouri Cheryl Wittenauer,
Associated Press AP, St. Louis, May 22, 2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 13 September 2011] "The minute
you start talking about it, individuals in the community will say, 'I may
know somebody who may be a victim," said Suzanne LeLaurin,
vice president of the International Institute, a refugee resettlement agency.
"The victims are so controlled by traffickers,
it's difficult to find them until you start doing assertive outreach and
investigation. "As soon as you
start doing that, you find them." Bills Target International Slave Trade Timothy Inklebarger,
The Associated Press AP, 27 March, 2005 www.nonprof.com/Corruption/human%20trafficking%20in%20alaska/Legislature%20looks%20at%20laws%20to
%20combat%20slave%20trafficking%20-%20SEX%20.txt [accessed 13 August 2014] Slave trafficking
is not a new problem on the world stage, but now states are responding to
calls to fight it at home - even in Alaska. Study Alleges Slavery In State Herbert A. Sample, The Sacramento Bee,
Oakland CA, February 26, 2005 [accessed 13 September 2011] The greatest number of victims were forced to work in prostitution, according
to the report. Others labored in garment sweatshops or as house
cleaners. The bulk of the abuses
occurred in and around Los Angeles and San Francisco, with a handful in San
Jose. Of the 554 victims, 136 were immigrants from Thailand and 104 from
Mexico. People from China, Cambodia, India, Russia, Vietnam, the Philippines
and eight other nations also were involved. A few victims were U.S. citizens. Forced-Labor Charges For Saudi Prince's
Wife Stephanie Ebbert
and Scott Goldstein, The Boston Globe, Winchester MA, March 31, 2005 www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2005/03/31/forced_labor_charges_for_saudi_princes_wife/ [partially accessed 13 January 2011 -
access restricted] The wife of a Saudi
prince was arrested yesterday for allegedly forcing two Indonesian
housekeepers to work for her family at homes in Arlington and Winchester for
meager wages over nearly two years. Russian woman pleads innocent to forcing
niece into prostitution Associated Press AP, Los Angeles, May 16,
2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] Her niece, who was
18 at the time and had come from a small town near St. Petersburg, told
investigators Okhotina hid her passport, destroyed
her plane ticket home and subjected her to regular beatings, threats and rape
by strangers, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said. Florida Man Accused of Buying Children for
use in Pornography NBC-2 News, Miami FL, 2/3/2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] A Florida man is
set to stand trial under a new federal law to fight human trafficking – the
first person to be tried under the law. Kent Frank, 48, is accused of trying
to buy children in Cambodia to be used in pornography. Irvine Couple Indicted On Involuntary
Servitude Charges For Holding Girl As Virtual Slave To Serve Their Family Debra W. Yang, U.S. Attorney, Central
District of California, February 2, 2005 – Press Release 05-021 www.justice.gov/usao/cac/Pressroom/pr2005/021.html [accessed 13 January 2011] www.justice.gov/archive/usao/cac/Pressroom/pr2005/021.html [accessed 4 March 2018] The indictment
alleges that Ibrahim and Motelib obtained the
victim's services through extortionate threats against the victim's sister in
Egypt. The couple then arranged through a third party to fraudulently obtain
a visa for the victim so she could travel to the United States. Ibrahim and Motelib then harbored the victim "in squalid
conditions and conceal[ed] her presence from
immigration, school, and police officials so that she could serve their
family as a domestic servant," the indictment reads. Opening our Eyes to the World's Trafficking
Nightmare Swanee Hunt, Scripps
Howard News Service, March 30, 2005 Click [here]
to access the article. Its URL is not
displayed because of its length [accessed 13 August 2014] “Neighbors, I’m
sure, thought I was family and had no idea I’d been sold for $2,500 to be a
servant,” described Micheline, a trafficking survivor, to a crowd at the International
Institute of Boston. Micheline, who lost her parents as a young child, was 14
when her extended family told her she was moving to the United States. Eager
and hopeful, her world crumbled when she found herself molested, abused, and
forced to look after three young children day and night.” Couple Indicted On Human Trafficking
Charges U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC,
February 8, 2005 – Press Release 05-050 www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2005/February/05_crt_050.htm [accessed 16 February 2016] According to the
three count indictment, Joseph Djoumessi and Evelyn
Djoumessi violated federal law by fraudulently
bringing a 14 year old Cameroonian girl into the United States and using her
as an unpaid domestic servant in their Farmington Hills, Michigan home for
almost four years. The Djoumessis are Cameroonian
nationals and permanent resident aliens of the United States. "Too often
human traffickers bait young girls with promises of the American dream only
to then force them into involuntary servitude. Civilized society cannot
tolerate this," said R. Alexander Acosta, Assistant Attorney General for
the Civil Rights Division. "The Justice Department takes these charges
very seriously and is committed to prosecuting those who attempt to profit by
the systematic abuse and degradation of others." Woman pleads guilty to holding a domestic
worker in involuntary servitude U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC,
March 25, 2004 – Press Release 04-188 www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2004/March/04_crt_188.htm [accessed 16 February 2016] In 1997, the
defendant, Mariska Trisanti, arranged for the
victim to travel from Indonesia to Los Angeles on a tourist visa, with the
expectation that the victim would work for her for two years as a nanny and
housekeeper. When the victim arrived in the United States however, Trisanti confiscated her passport to prevent her from
running away and put her to work for 17 hours or more per day, seven days a
week. The victim received virtually no compensation for her labor. Although Trisanti initially made some payments to the victim's
relatives, even those payments stopped entirely after the first year of
service. Farm Contractors Plead Guilty In Slavery
Case Clarisse Butler, New York Teacher, February
17, 2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 19 June 2013] [accessed 4 March 2018] The town of Albion grabbed
national headlines in June 2002 when six migrant farm workers narrowly
escaped the camps where they were being held in virtual slavery. Now, in federal plea agreements, a family of farm labor contractors have pleaded guilty to
charges of forced labor and harboring illegal aliens. FROM THE MEAN STREETS OF MEXICO TO THE SAD
STREETS OF QUEENS. News investigation into the plight of young women forced
into horror of prostitution Nicole Bode, New York Daily News, Apr 02,
2005 [accessed 19 June 2013] Before the night is
over, the girls of "Zona Rosa" - a notorious red-light district
just a few blocks from the main tourist drag in this Mexican border town -
will make as much as $250 each by selling sex. It's cold-blooded sexual slavery - forced
prostitution that began when they were kidnapped from their small towns in
Mexico and Central America and smuggled through a dangerous corridor that
leads into the United States. After
they work their apprenticeships in Tijuana, many of the girls end up as
sexual servants in New York's illegal brothels. Livonia Man Pleads Guilty to Crimes
Relating to Involuntary Servitude of Eastern European Women at Detroit Area
Strip Clubs Stephen J. Murphy, United States Attorney,
Eastern District of Michiga, U.S. Department of
Justice, March 8, 2006 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] Maksimenko admitted today
that he and his business partners, including Aronov,
trafficked in Eastern European women and used the guise of a legitimate
business – Beauty Search, Inc. – to cover their criminal conduct. Maksimenko admitted that he and his partners smuggled
women into the United States and compelled them through threats and coercion
to work as dancers in strip clubs. To maintain compliance, Maksimenko and his partners took a number of steps,
including confiscating the dancers' passports; imposing large debts on them;
enforcing rules designed to isolate the dancers from potential rescuers
through interrogations, monetary penalties, physical violence and threats;
searching the dancers' apartments; and threatening to turn the dancers in to
authorities because of their illegal immigrant status. According to Aronov's plea agreement, Maksimenko
forced the dancers to engage in nonconsensual sexual relations with him, by
intimidating and threatening them with arrest and deportation and by
reminding them that they owed him a debt for employing them. Region's human traffic is targeted - Task
force to prosecute sex-trade, slavery cases Mark Arner, San
Diego Union-Tribune, March 30, 2005 www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20050330/news_1m30human.html [accessed 13 January 2011] legacy.sandiegouniontribune.com/uniontrib/20050330/news_1m30human.html [accessed 4 March 2018] Many of the girls
and young women had been promised work as maids and were smuggled into San
Diego from Mexico and Central America.
However, authorities said they weren't able to build a strong-enough
case in the rush to rescue minors, and the charges were dropped. Three Mexicans Plead Guilty in New York
Human-Trafficking Case Sharing Electronic Resources and Laws on
Crime SHERLOC, UNODC No.:USA012 [accessed 4 March 2018] Between 1991 and
2004, Josue Flores Carreto, Gerardo Flores Carreto, and Daniel Perez Alonso, were members of a
criminal organization that obliged young Mexican women into prostitution
through force, fraud, and coercion. The men recruited young, uneducated
women, from impoverished backgrounds from Mexico, smuggled them to the United
States, and forced them to engage in prostitution in the New York City
metropolitan area. The men physically and sexually assaulted their victims,
used threats of physical harm and restraint in order to force the women to
commit acts of prostitution. The women were beaten for hiding money,
disobeying their orders, and failing to earn enough money. The defendants and
their associates confiscated all of the victim’s earnings. Homegrown Sex Trafficking Excerpted from: Washington Times, April 29,
2005 www.washingtontimes.com/news/2005/apr/28/20050428-095319-7893r/ [accessed 4 September 2012] Escape is often
impossible. Fear maintains their victim status. Minors live in fear of
sadistic acts by "customers," fear of being beaten and abused if
they fail to bring in their quota (ranging from $500 to $1,800 a day/night),
fear of losing their coping mechanisms (drugs and alcohol), and fear of
losing a place to live and food to eat. These children are also ashamed and
fear their families will find out what they have been doing. They fear the
police and fear being returned home. U.S. Cooperates with Europe to Combat Sex
Trafficking - Fact Sheet Department of State, United States of
America: International Information Programs. January 2005 iipdigital.usembassy.gov/st/english/article/2005/01/20050106133608cjsamoht4.548281e-02.html#axzz3AIAoAAAX [accessed 13 August 2014] www.demandforum.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/la.traffick.report.2005.pdf [accessed 4 March 2018] DOJ estimated in
June 2004 that 14,500-17,500 people were being trafficked into the United
States annually: 3,500-5,500 from Europe and Eurasia …3,500-5,500 from Latin
America … 5,000-7,000 from East Asia and the Pacific … 200-700 from Africa
…200- 600 from South Asia … 0- 200 from the Near East Ending the quiet
tragedy of modern-day slavery Leland Y. Yee, Assembly Speaker Pro Tem,
San Francisco Chronicle, February 17, 2005 www.sfgate.com/opinion/openforum/article/Ending-the-quiet-tragedy-of-modern-day-slavery-2729680.php [accessed 15 August 2012] In the past 12
months, immigration agents have raided a number of suspected brothels in
quiet San Francisco neighborhoods, exposing a previously unseen tragedy. Despite shock at
how it could happen here, prostitution of youth is sadly all too common in
our community and, in fact, often involves children as young as 9 years old.
Child prostitution is a devastating problem that few people want to talk
about. The fact remains that rarely do child prostitutes begin selling their
bodies on their own. Many are coerced into the lifestyle and forced into
virtual slavery by traffickers and pimps. According to the advocacy
organization Standing Against Global Exploitation, 85 percent of child
prostitutes previously suffered incest, rape or abuse at home, and are often
singled out by pimps because they are runaways. - htsccp HHS asks doctors to watch for human
trafficking Victoria Stagg Elliott, American Medical
News, March 14, 2005 www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2005/03/14/hlsb0314.htm [accessed 14 January 2011] Over the years, David
McCollum, MD, has seen patients who seemed to be in an abusive situation but
didn't quite fit the profile for victims of domestic violence. But there were
common themes. Someone was always with these patients, never letting them speak for themselves, and even if they did, their English
was limited or nonexistent. They also always seemed insecure and
uncomfortable. Dr. McCollum, an
emergency physician from Chanhassen, Minn., and chair of the AMA National
Advisory Council on Violence and Abuse, now thinks these patients may have
been victims of human trafficking -- a modern form of slavery in which people
are moved across borders and subjected to sexual exploitation, forced labor
or indentured servitude. "A lot of people are being trafficked, but it's
underreported," he said. Thanks to the Dept.
of Health and Human Services, resources are now becoming available to help
physicians identify the problem. HHS is rolling out its "Rescue and
Restore Victims of Human Trafficking" awareness campaign to provide physicians
and other health care professionals tools to detect victims of this crime. Sex slaves hidden victims in trade Peter Huck, The New Zealand Herald, Mar 5,
2005 www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10113642 [accessed 14 January 2011] Unlike the open
slavery practised in the past, the victims of
modern bondage live in a shadowy world where threats of violence guarantee
their silence and protect their oppressors from legal retribution. "If you get caught with guns and drugs
you'll get a long prison term," says Rick Castro, a deputy sheriff with
the San Diego County Sheriff's Department and a veteran of the war against
modern slavers. "But if you're a
trafficker you've already told your victims that if they talk to the cops
they'll be killed or raped. Or their family members back home will be killed.
So there's less chance of being caught." Waipahu man guilty of slavery Susan Essoyan,
Honolulu Star-Bulletin, December 15, 2004 archives.starbulletin.com/2004/12/15/news/story6.html [accessed 14 January 2011] Lueleni Fetongi Maka was accused of
luring Tongans here and forcing them to work.
Maka was accused of luring seven Tongan men
to Hawaii with promises of a better life and then forcing them to work for
his landscaping businesses, housing them in squalid conditions, and
controlling them with beatings and threats of deportation. Sex trafficking
strikes closer to home than thought S.M. Berg, The Portland Alliance, November
18, 2004 www.health.state.mn.us/injury/new/svpnews.cfm?gcNews=30 [accessed 16 February 2016] [scroll down] A bed, a teddy bear,
and a roll of paper towels are the only contents of a closet-sized room where
a trafficked 13-year-old girl was sold for sex by pimps to 20-30 men a day. On Nov. 5, 2003, a
woman taken from the Lloyd Center shopping mall was found to have been drugged
awake for three straight days of sexual slavery by traffickers in Vancouver,
Canada. Traffickers forced
three dozen Mexican men and boys recruited in Arizona to work 60 hours a week
on farms near Buffalo, N.Y. for $30 a week. So where are these
women, men and children who have been forced to endure slave-like conditions
and where can we find them in Portland? Despite 33 percent of the opening
anecdotes being about men and boys trafficked for labor, only 20 percent of
trafficking is of males and less than half of all trafficking is for labor.
Considering 75 percent of female victims are trafficked for commercial sexual
exploitation, a boom industry in Portland, it was rightly stated by speaker
Mohamed Y. Mattar that, “too many people in this
country do not understand the link between prostitution and crime, between
prostitution and AIDS, between prostitution and trafficking.” Department of Justice announces human
trafficking task force in the District of Columbia and grants for law
enforcement to fight human trafficking and assist victims U.S. Department of Justice, Washington DC,
November 23, 2004 – Press Release 04-760 www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2004/November/04_opa_760.htm [accessed 14 January 2011] Assistant Attorney
General R. Alexander Acosta of the Civil Rights Division, Assistant Attorney
General Christopher A. Wray of the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney
Kenneth L. Wainstein of the District of Columbia announced today that the Department
of Justice is awarding more than $7.6 million in grants-of which $450,000
will go to the District of Columbia-to enable state and local law enforcement
to fight human trafficking by creating task forces to aid in the
identification and rescue of human trafficking victims. 'Modern-Day Slavery' Prompts Rescue Efforts Lena H. Sun, The Washington Post, 2 May
2004 www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61457-2004May2_4.html [accessed 14 January 2011] Among the
experiences of the principal victim were: working from 6 AM until Midnight
every single day; cutting the grass of a huge yard (and shoveling the huge
driveway in Winter alone, by hand) while simultaneously caring for three
children, washing, cleaning and cooking for a family of five; putting up with
the all-day screams and verbal insults of the wife in the diplomatic family;
not being permitted to ever leave the house alone; not being permitted to go
anywhere on her weekend time off unless she was accompanied. Upon
arranging for the escape of this woman, our family gave her
a place to stay and work until she was able to establish her
independence. Halla forbade Muka from bathing because "she did not want my germs
in the shower," Muka wrote. Halla often slapped her and kicked her while wearing
boots and shoes. Once, Halla noticed a scratch on the baby's nose. "She
pulled a knife out of the drawer and demonstrated pulling the knife across
her throat as if to slice it," Muka wrote.
"While she was doing this, she looked at me and said that if a scratch
occurred again, she would kill me."
Halla confiscated her passport and told her
"bad people" would hurt her if she ever left, according to Muka's statement. Muka said she
imagined government officials tracking her down. Department of
Homeland Security immigration officials were able to track the diplomat, but
he had returned to the United Arab Emirates. The (ongoing) San Diego, California Child
Mass Sexual Slavery Scandal LibertadLatina, July 31, 2009 www.libertadlatina.org/LatAm_US_San_Diego_Crisis_Index.htm [accessed 8 January 2011] The articles here
below describe one of the largest known child and youth sex trafficking cases
in the United States to date. In one of several related cases, hundreds
of Mexican girls between 7 and 18 were kidnapped or subjected to false
romantic entrapment by organized criminal sex trafficking gangs.
Victims were then brought to San Diego County, California. Over a 10
year period these girls were raped by hundreds of men per day in more than 2
dozen home based and agricultural camp based brothels. Slavery Continues in the Form of Forced
Prostitution Ed Vitagliano,
Agape Press, April 15, 2004 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] www.christianheadlines.com/news/1257639.html [accessed 17 February 2019] "I'm reading
about how they lured these girls from Asian nations, promised them restaurant
jobs, modeling jobs, ... seized their passports, beat them, raped them, moved
them from brothel to brothel," he said.
This was not happening in some distant Third World nation, however.
"There it was in civil Seattle," Miller said. Washington state a hotbed for human
trafficking, report says Florangela Davila, The Seattle
Times, Jul 14, 2004 seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2001979041_trafficking14m.html [accessed 14 January 2011] community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=20040714&slug=trafficking14m [accessed 5 March 2018] A new report says
Washington state is a hotbed for what many say is a modern form of slavery:
human trafficking, the recruitment, transportation and sale of people for
labor. The state's international
border with Canada, its many ports, rural areas and dependency on
agricultural workers make Washington prone to such exploitation, according to
the report Based on extensive
interviews with local social-service providers, the report notes trafficking
has occurred in 18 Washington state counties, with victims ranging from
"mail-order" brides to sex workers to domestic workers and
children. The local victims have been brought from Russia, the Philippines,
China and Mexico. But what has been
difficult, according to the task force, is coming up with an actual number of
trafficking victims. "It's just
like domestic violence and sexual assault 20 years ago," said Emery.
"We didn't know those numbers either. We just knew it was there." S.F. parlor hit in crackdown on sex slave
trade Phillip Matier
& Andrew Ross, The San Francisco Chronicle, October 25, 2004 [accessed 4 September 2012] Earlier this month
-- two weeks after the U.S. Justice Department and local police announced a
new crime-fighting task force -- agents raided a massage parlor in an alley
off Mission Street, just a short hop from some of San Francisco's biggest
hotels. Inside, authorities rounded up
17 young Asian women believed to have been trafficked into the country for
sex and slave labor. Many were found
in a basement, reachable only through a false wall inside a cabinet. The two later told
investigators they had been smuggled from Canada into the United States in
May and taken directly to King's, where one of the managers allegedly paid
$32,000 to the person who had transported them. The two women said
they briefly escaped in August, but were soon found by the manager and two
other workers, returned to King's and beaten. New York Couple Pleads Guilty to Alien
Smuggling Charges U.S. Department of State, Press Release, 09
November 2004 iipdigital.usembassy.gov/st/english/texttrans/2004/11/20041109125514cmretrop0.8842584.html#axzz3AIAoAAAX [accessed 13 August 2014] www.libertadlatina.org/US_New_York_Peruvians_Enslaved_In_Long_Island_06-22-2004.htm [accessed 5 March 2018] [accessed 17 February 2019] A couple in eastern
New York state has pleaded guilty to a variety of charges related to
smuggling Peruvians into the United States and subjecting them to forced
labor. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced the pleas
November 5 in a press release. Mariluz Zavala and Jorge
Ibanez were arrested last June when authorities raided the couple's homes and
discovered 69 illegal aliens from Peru and a large quantity of fraudulent
identification documents. The press release
says that the couple devised a scheme starting in 1999 to obtain phony visas
to get Peruvians into the United States illegally. They charged the would-be
immigrants a hefty sum for the trip. Then the couple threatened to turn their
victims over to authorities, keeping them in forced labor situations and
confiscating their wages. Ending Modern Day Slavery: U.S. Efforts To
Combat Trafficking in Persons Paula J. Dobriansky,
Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs, Remarks to the Northern
California World Affairs Council, San Francisco CA, March 30, 2004 2001-2009.state.gov/g/rls/rm/2004/31063.htm [accessed 19 June 2013] But the trafficking
issue is not just an issue for foreign governments. The United States is not
a source nation for trafficking victims, who tend to come from places with
large numbers of young people looking to move elsewhere for opportunity. It
is, however, a transit point and destination for trafficking victims. This is
true in many places across the country, including the Bay Area, where women
have been enslaved and forced to play a role in illegal commercial sexual
exploitation. Domestically, we
are fighting this scourge through a number of different means. With the
active involvement of Attorney General John Ashcroft, the Department of
Justice has significantly increased federal trafficking prosecutions. There
have been 83 convictions or guilty pleas since an aggressive anti-trafficking
initiative was launched March 2001. In January 2004, there were 344 open
investigations of trafficking. Thanks again to the Trafficking Victims
Protection Act, those found guilty of trafficking crimes face significantly
increased jail time -- up to 20 years in prison from the previous maximum of
10 years for many infractions, and up to life imprisonment under certain
circumstances. Probe into Iraq trafficking claims Cable News Network CNN, Washington DC, May
5, 2004 edition.cnn.com/2004/US/05/05/iraq.india.trafficking/ [accessed 15 January 2011] Indian press
reports said that Indian nationals in Jordan and Kuwait were recruited for jobs
in U.S. military camps in Iraq as cooks, butchers, laundry workers and
handymen. Some of the Indians
charge they signed up through Indian employment companies to work in Kuwait,
but ended up in Iraq working for low pay and were refused permission to leave
the country. Testimony of Professor Mohamed Mattar, Co-Director, Protection Project, Johns Hopkins
University, July 7, 2004 U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary,
Hearings, “Examining U.S. Efforts to Combat Human Trafficking and Slavery”,
July 7, 2004 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[accessed 13 September 2011] www.judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/mattar_testimony_07_07_04.pdf [accessed 5 March 2018] Based upon the
analysis conducted by The Protection Project on these cases, which the Department
of Justice kindly made available, I can say that the majority of victims that
are trafficked into the U.S. come from countries in Africa, especially
Cameroon, Nigeria, Ghana and Tonga; Latin America, especially Jamaica,
Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala; Asia, especially South Korea, Indonesia,
Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Thailand and China and Russia. They are trafficked
to different states, in particular, California, Florida, New York, Hawaii,
Georgia, Alaska, Texas and North Carolina.
They are trafficked for the purposes of prostitution, other forms of
sexual exploitation, forced labor and domestic service. A Crackdown On the Traffic In Humans Christopher Marquis, The New York Times,
Washington DC, February 26, 2003 www.nytimes.com/2003/02/26/world/a-crackdown-on-the-traffic-in-humans.html [accessed 17 February 2019] "Each year,
tens of thousands of people -- predominantly women and children – are
trafficked into the United States," Mr. Ashcroft said. "Even one is
one too many. These innocent victims are kidnapped or lured with false
promises of good jobs and better lives.
They are then abused and cruelly exploited." The attorney
general cited recent cases that he said reflected the personal tragedies of
foreign-born women and children. A 14-year-old girl from Cameroon was lured
to Maryland by a couple who promised an American education; instead she
served three years as a domestic servant and was sexually abused. In
California, a well-known landlord pleaded guilty to trafficking in girls from
India, who were put into sexual servitude. Four indicted in Alaska for luring Russian
girls and women to U.S. and enslaving them in a strip club U.S. Department of Justice, Washington DC,
February 22, 2001 – Press Release 01-76 www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2001/February/076crt.htm [accessed 16 February 2016] Four people were
charged today in Alaska with conspiring to enslave Russian women and girls in
a strip club in Anchorage, the Justice Department announced. This is the
first case prosecuted under the Victims of Trafficking and Violence
Protection Act of 2000, enacted by Congress in October 2000 to stop the
practice of trafficking in humans. Victor Virchenko, Pavel Agafonov, Tony
Kennard and Rachel Kennard were charged under a 23-count indictment with
conspiring to lure six Russian women and girls to Alaska to enslave them. Virchenko is a Russian national, Agafonov
is a naturalized U.S. citizen, and Tony and Rachel Kennard are U.S. citizens.
The four defendants were previously indicted for falsely representing to
immigration authorities that the Russian women would be in the United States
for a cultural exchange. Today's superceding indictment charges that the defendants
recruited the females under false pretenses - to perform Russian folk dances
in a cultural festival - only to force them into servitude once they arrived
in the United States. The charges against the defendants include six counts
of forced labor [18 U.S.C. §1589], for coercing the victims to perform in a
strip club by employing a scheme that relied on threats, isolation, and
confiscation of the victims' passports, visas, and plane tickets. NCC Endorses Consumer Boycotts of Taco
Bell, Mt. Olive Pickle Products National Council of Churches NCC News
Service, Jackson, Miss., November 6, 2003 www.ncccusa.org/news/03boycottfinal.html [accessed 15 January 2011] IN RECENT WEEKS, THE
COALITION OF IMMOKALEE WORKERS HAS BEEN RECOGNIZED BY - The Robert F.
Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights, which has selected Julia Gabriel, Lucas
Benitez and Romeo Ramirez, three leaders of the Coalition of Immokalee
Workers, to receive the prestigious 2003 RFK Human Rights Award for their
work against slavery in the fields and for the Taco Bell Boycott.
Through their work, they have helped liberate more than 1,000 workers held
against their will by employers using violence – beatings, pistol-whippings,
shootings – and the threat of violence, according to the center. Ms.
Gabriel herself is a former captive worker who escaped from a 400-worker
slavery ring that operated in the fields of South Carolina and Florida.
With the assistance of the CIW, Ms. Gabriel successfully helped prosecute and
put her employer behind bars. CIW Anti-Slavery Campaign Coalition of Immokalee Workers CIW,
Immokalee, FL, 2008 www.ciw-online.org/slavery.html [accessed 15 January 2011] [accessed 5 March 2018] The CIW's
Anti-Slavery Campaign is a worker-based approach to eliminating modern-day
slavery in the agricultural industry. In the most recent
case to be brought to court, a federal grand jury indicted six people in
Immokalee on January 17th, 2008, for their part in what US Attorney Doug
Molloy called "slavery, plain and simple" (Ft. Myers News-Press,
“Group accused of keeping, beating, stealing from Immokalee laborers,”
1/18/08).
The employers were charged with beating workers who were unwilling to work or
who attempted to leave their employ picking tomatoes, holding their workers
in debt, and chaining and locking workers inside u-haul
trucks as punishment ("How
about a side order of human rights," Miami Herald, 12/16/07) Sixth Immokalee slavery case suspect
arrested - Group accused of keeping beating, stealing from Immokalee laborers Pat Gillespie, The News-Press, January 18,
2008 ciw-online.org/Slavery_plain_and_simple.html [accessed 15 January 2011] ciw-online.org/blog/2008/01/slavery_plain_and_simple/ [accessed 5 March 2018] For two years,
federal prosecutors claim, Vargas, along with Cesar, Geovanni, Jose, Villhina and Ismael Navarrete held more than a dozen
people as slaves on their property. They made them sleep in box trucks and
shacks, charged them for food and showers, didn't pay them for picking
produce and beat them if they tried to leave. According to the
federal indictment, the Navarrete family and Vargas threatened the
immigrants, held their identification documents, created debit accounts they
couldn't repay and hooked them on alcohol to keep them working. The documents
list 13 instances when the workers were beaten. Molloy said he couldn't
reveal where they are today, but said they're safe. "Some of the
folks have been there for years," Molloy said. "It is the hope to
send back money to their families, and they hang on to that hope. It's just a
situation that's difficult to get out of." Six Indicted in Conspiracy for Trafficking
and Holding Migrant Workers in Conditions of Forced Labor in Western New York U.S. Department of Justice, Washington DC,
June 19, 2002 – Press Release 02-360 www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2002/June/02_crt_360.htm [accessed 15 January 2011] Assistant Attorney
General Ralph F. Boyd, Jr. and Michael A. Battle, United States Attorney for
the Western District of New York, announced an eighteen-count indictment
against six defendants who participated in a scheme to recruit, transport and
harbor undocumented Mexican migrant workers, and then held them in conditions
of forced labor at migrant labor camps near Buffalo, New York. Department of Justice Deserves Kudos for
Cracking Down on Traffickers Exploiting Immigrant Workers Carl R. Baldwin, Immigration Daily, June
24, 2002 www.ilw.com/articles/2002,0710-baldwin.shtm [accessed 15 January 2011] The scheme cooked
up by the conspirators involved going to Arizona to recruit and transport
undocumented Mexican migrant workers, and then hold them in conditions of
peonage in labor camps near Buffalo, New York. In a scenario worthy of a John
Steinbeck novel, the roughly forty workers were often not paid for their
grueling work, and were subjected to verbal abuse, threats of physical harm
if they tried to leave, and, of course, of arrest and deportation by the INS.
In the wake of the Supreme Court's March 27, 2002 decision in the Hoffman
Plastic Compounds, Inc. v. NLRB case, it goes without saying that the
employer did not have to be concerned about a lawsuit demanding back pay by his
undocumented workers. "Exploit away!" must have been the watchword. U.S. Has 10,000 Forced Laborers,
Researchers Say Lena H. Sun, Washington Post, September 23,
2004 www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43473-2004Sep22.html [accessed 15 January 2011] At least 10,000
people are working as forced laborers at any given time across the United
States, according to a new report that details the nature and extent of
"modern-day slavery." The study says the laborers are working for
little or no pay on farms, in restaurants and sweatshops and as domestic
servants and prostitutes. The report,
"Hidden Slaves: Forced Labor in the United States," is to be
released today on Capitol Hill by the University of California at Berkeley's
Human Rights Center and the Washington-based anti-slavery group Free the
Slaves. Part 1: Some foreign household workers
enslaved Stephanie Armour,
USA TODAY, 11/19/2001 www.usatoday.com/money/general/2001/11/19/cover.htm [accessed 15 January 2011] Among recent cases
- • In a middle-class subdivision of Laredo, Texas, known for brick homes and
manicured yards, a 12-year-old Mexican girl sent by her family to clean and
provide childcare in exchange for schooling was found shackled in a backyard,
according to prosecutors. Police were summoned after a neighbor doing roof
work looked down, saw the girl and called 911. The girl had been chained
after finishing her work, starved until she became so hungry she ate dirt and
tortured by having pepper spray blasted into her eyes when she dozed off,
prosecutors say. She was so weak, she had to be carried on a stretcher,
prosecutors say, and her skin had been seared red from days in the sun. Woman held as slave, feds say - (forced to
work, sexually abused for 4 years before freed) Alicia Caldwell, Denver Post, June 10, 2005 www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1420792/posts [accessed 15 January 2011] An Aurora couple
were indicted Thursday, accused of enslaving an Indonesian woman in their
home for four years, forcing her to cook and clean without pay. The husband also is accused of repeatedly
sexually assaulting the woman, records show. Federal indictments
handed up Thursday accuse the couple of keeping the woman in servitude to
care for their children and perform other domestic chores without paying her. U.S., Canadian And Mexican Representatives
Meet To Combat Sexual Exploitation Of Children Penn News, University of Pennsylvania,
Philadelphia, November 28, 2001 [accessed 15 January 2011] Conferees will look
at a situation in which thousands of children are trafficked into North
America for sexual purposes annually from poorer nations in Central and South
America, Central and Eastern Europe and East and Southeast Asia. The
commercial sexual trade of at least 200,000 children was documented in a
report released earlier this year by Richard Estes, a Penn professor of
social work and the conference's chair. Other newly
released information from the Penn study shows that Canada is an easy gateway
into the U.S. for sexually exploited children from China, the Philippines,
Thailand, Cambodia and Central and Eastern Europe. "Due to relaxed
border controls between the U.S. and Canada," Estes said, " trafficked children are able to be moved with
comparative ease and meet with little or no official interference." Slavery in America [PDF] Public Broadcasting Service PBS Online NewsHour, March 8, 2001 thaicdc.org/cms/assets/Uploads/human-trafficking/PBS-SLAVERY-IN-AMERICA.pdf [accessed 13 August 2014] [scroll down] A SLAVE'S STORY -
THONGLIM KAMPIRANON
(Translated)
- I
would wake up about 6:00 or 7:00 in the morning and start cleaning the house.
Around 10:00, Supewon would then take me to the
restaurant. I'd work there until about midnight. When I got back home, I
could only have a few hours sleep and then I had to
wake up and start cleaning the house again the next morning. Fact Sheet - Worker Exploitation U.S. Department of Justice,
Washington DC, March 27, 2001 – Press Release 01-126 www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2001/March/126cr.htm [accessed 16
February 2016] WORKER
EXPLOITATION CASES - v On Friday, March
23, 2001, Mr. Kill Soo Lee was arrested in American Samoa on a two count
federal complaint charging violations of the slavery statutes. These charges
are based on allegations that Mr. Lee held mostly female workers from Vietnam
in involuntary servitude at his garment factory by threatening to enslave
them over the next 20 years. This is the second case brought under the
Victims of Trafficking of Violence Protection Act. U.S. v. Soo Lee v In March of 2001, Lakireddy Bali Reddy, a landlord in Berkeley, California,
pleaded guilty to trafficking women into the United States and placing them
into sexual servitude. An expanded investigation revealed that Reddy and
certain family members conspired to bring at lest
25 Indian laborers into the Unites States by conspiring to commit immigration
fraud. U.S. v. Reddy v In February of 2001,
Michael Allen Lee pleaded guilty to using cocaine, threats and beatings to
force homeless African-Americans to work in his agricultural fields in
Florida. He indebted the workers through short-term loans and compelled them
to harvest his land against their will.U.S. v.
Lee> v In February of
2001, Jose Tecum, an Immokalee, Florida man, was
sentenced to nine years in prison for felony counts including kidnaping,
slavery, and immigration violations. The defendant was found guilty by a jury
of illegally smuggling a young woman from Guatemala and forcing her to work
in the migrant fields of Florida and engage in sex acts.U.S.
v. Tecum Hidden in the Home: Abuse of Domestic
Workers with Special Visas in the United States Human Rights Watch, Vol 13, No. 2 (G), June
2001 www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/2001/usadom/ [accessed 15 January 2011] SUMMARY - In the worst
cases, the domestic workers are victims of trafficking-deceived about the
conditions of their employment, brought to the United States, and held in
servitude or performing forced labor. They work up to nineteen hours per day;
are allowed to leave their employers' premises rarely and virtually never
alone; are paid far less than the minimum wage, sometimes $100 or less per
month; are ordered not to speak with individuals outside their employers'
families; and are psychologically, physically and/or sexually abused. In
these cases, workers' isolation is so extreme and the culture of fear created
by their employers through explicit threats and/or psychological domination
is so great that the workers believe they will suffer serious harm if they
leave their jobs and have no choice but to remain in and continue laboring in
abusive conditions. Drama marks 'modern-day slavery' trial Peter Franceschina,
Fort Myers News-Press, Oct.18, 2000 www.ciw-online.org/slaverystory1.html [accessed 15 January 2011] ciw-online.org/blog/2000/10/slaverystory1/ [accessed 5 March 2018] Sitting on the
witness stand in federal court, the 20-year-old Guatemalan woman wouldn't
look at the man accused of kidnapping her from her mountain village and
taking her to the farm fields last fall to work in indentured servitude. After two weeks in
California, they took a bus to Fort Myers and got a ride to Immokalee, where Tecum’s wife and three children lived in an apartment.
There, Tecum took her to the fields and kept her
pay, saying she owed him about $1,000 for smuggling her into the country, the
woman said. She said he also forced her to have sex when his wife wasn’t
around. Imported Servants Allege Abuse By Foreign
Host Families in U.S. William Branigin,
The Washington Post, January 5, 1999 www.friends-partners.org/partners/stop-traffic/1999/0002.html [accessed 15 January 2011] Thousands of
domestic servants are being brought into the United States from impoverished
countries and then severely exploited by foreign employers, many of whom work
for embassies and international organizations in the Washington area,
according to human rights groups, immigration attorneys and former domestics. An Ethiopian woman
who was brought to the United States in 1990 by an IMF official says she
toiled for more than eight years in a Silver Spring apartment until she
escaped in May. She says her employers forced her to work seven days a week,
isolated her from other people and hit her if she complained. Another Ethiopian
says she received no pay for more than six years of work in the Rockville
home of an Ethiopian-born couple who arranged for her to come to the United
States on a tourist visa. She says her duties included caring for the
couple's sick child on 24-hour call. A nanny from the
Philippines says three other Filipinos -- her employers and a friend of
theirs -- arranged to bring her in fraudulently under a visa for servants of
embassy employees, then put her to work in Fairfax
for 41 cents an hour. For more than a year before she escaped, she says, she
had to work 16 hours a day and received only one day off during the entire
period. One FBI-led team is
investigating a well-off Brazilian businessman and his wife who allegedly
held an illiterate servant from their homeland in slave-like conditions for
19 years while she worked in their suburban Maryland home. The servant, who is about 60, came to
authorities' attention recently when she had to be hospitalized for treatment
of a long-neglected stomach tumor. She told local social workers that she
sometimes had to beg neighbors for food and clothing and was regularly beaten
by the wife. She said the couple told her that if she fled their home, she
would be arrested immediately because she is black. trafficking case/US govt
action The Washington Post, 4/24/98 p. A21 www.friends-partners.org/partners/stop-traffic/1998/0024.html [accessed 15 January 2011] Sixteen members of
a Mexican family operation headquartered in Veracruz were accused [in a
52-count indictment in Fort Pierce, Florida] of luring young women to the
United States with the promise of a better life and then forcing them into
prostitution to pay off their smuggling fees. International Trafficking in Women to the
United States: A Contemporary Manifestation of Slavery and Organized Crime [PDF] Amy O’Neill Richard, Analyst, U.S. State
Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research, November 1999 [accessed 15 January 2011] INTRODUCTION - Trafficking of
women and children for the sex industry and for labor is prevalent in all
regions of the United States. An estimated 45,000 to 50,000 women and
children are trafficked annually to the United States, primarily by small
crime rings and loosely connected criminal networks. The trafficked victims
have traditionally come from Southeast Asia and Latin America; however,
increasingly they are coming from the New Independent States and Central and
Eastern Europe. Trafficking to the US is likely to increase given weak
economies and few job opportunities in the countries of origin; low risk of
prosecution and enormous profit potential for the traffickers; and improved
international transportation infrastructures. Though it may be impossible to
eradicate trafficking to the US, it is possible to diminish the problem
significantly by targeted prevention and micro-credit strategies in the
source countries; strengthening the penalties and laws against traffickers in
this country; and enhancing assistance and protections for the victims. [back] All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this webpage as: Patt,
Prof. Martin, "Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery - USA",
http://gvnet.com/humantrafficking/USA.htm, [accessed <date>] |
|