Migrant workers treated as slaves in US, say officials

For years, migrant workers have been brought from Mexico and Central America and forced into slavery under "brutal" and "inhuman" working conditions on South Georgia farms, according to a federal indictment unsealed recently.

The migrant workers were forced "to perform physically demanding work for little or no pay", the Justice Department said.

The workers were required to dig onions with their bare hands, paid 20 cents for each bucket harvested, and threatened with guns and violence if they got out of line.

The workers were held in cramped, unsanitary quarters and fenced work camps with little or no food, limited plumbing and without safe water, the department said. At least two workers were said to have died as a result of workplace conditions.

The alleged conspirators in the operation are said to have reaped more than $200 million, including from laundering funds through cash purchases of land, homes, vehicles and businesses, through cash purchases of cashier's checks and by funneling millions of dollars through a casino.

The investigation, dubbed Operation Blooming Onion, was led by the Department of Homeland Security and involved many federal agencies. As a result, two dozen people, including US residents in Georgia, Texas and Florida and citizens of Mexico illegally living in the US, have been charged.

"The American dream is a powerful attraction for destitute and desperate people across the globe, and where there is need, there is greed from those who will attempt to exploit these willing workers for their own obscene profits," said US Attorney David Estes for the Southern District of Georgia.

"Thanks to outstanding work from our law enforcement partners, Operation Blooming Onion frees more than 100 individuals from the shackles of modern-day slavery and will hold accountable those who put them in chains."

The accused are alleged to have raped, kidnapped and attempted to kill or threatened to kill some of the workers or their relatives, and in many cases sold or traded the workers to other conspirators.

Passports confiscated

According to the indictment, to prevent the laborers from escaping, the conspirators unlawfully confiscated their passports and documents. The laborers were charged unlawful fees for transportation, food and housing. Even though they were recruited for agricultural work, some migrants were illegally used for lawn care, construction and repair tasks.

Farm business owners Maria Leticia Patricio and Daniel Mendoza are alleged to have filed fraudulent applications of the H-2A visa to bring in workers from Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras illegally. Since 2015 they had sent out false petitions to seek more than 71,000 foreign laborers to enter the US, it is alleged.

The H-2A guest-worker visa program has been booming in Georgia and across the US because of a farm labor shortage. According to the federal Office of Foreign Labor Certification, Georgia had 27,614 H-2A positions certified last year, compared with 5,500 in 2010.

The Labor Department approved 317,619 seasonal guest-workers in the fiscal year ended Sept 30, up 15 percent from a year earlier. It is the highest number of jobs ever approved for H-2A guest worker visas.

Farmworker Justice, a labor advocacy group, said abuses such as wage theft, sex discrimination and unsafe job conditions were rampant in the guest worker program partly because the workers could lose their jobs and be forced to leave the country if they complain.