Freight Dog
Well-known member
- Joined
- Nov 26, 2001
- Posts
- 2,232
Not meaning to start a flame war, but can anyone else see how this could corelate to PFT scams?
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Involuntary Servitude Case Opens
By JAYMES SONG
.c The Associated Press
HONOLULU (AP) - The owner of an American Samoa garment factory had employees starved and beaten and threatened to have them deported if they spoke out about working conditions, a federal prosecutor told jurors.
``This case is about modern day slavery and this defendant's greed,'' federal prosecutor Susan French said during opening statements Wednesday in an involuntary servitude case.
Kil Soo Lee, of South Korea, and two of his managers, Virginia Solia`i and Robert Atimalala, were charged last year with holding hundreds of Vietnamese and Chinese workers in involuntary servitude at the Daewoosa Samoa Ltd. factory.
If convicted on all 22 counts, Lee faces up to 390 years in prison, Atimalala up to 80 years, and Solia`i up to 210 years. Dozens of witnesses are expected to take the stand in the trial, which could last up to five months.
Defense lawyers told jurors the plant had labor problems, in part because of language differences and financial difficulties. Atimalala and Solia`i's attorneys also said their clients had little or nothing to do with supervising employees.
The now-closed factory in the U.S. territory 2,300 miles south of Hawaii had made clothes for J.C. Penney and other retailers before the U.S. Labor Department reported worker abuses.
Workers had aspirations of the ``American dream'' for a better life, earning good benefits and sending money back to their families, prosecutors said, but what they discovered was the opposite.
Seamstresses, who were required to pay thousands of dollars to secure a job at Daewoosa, were housed in a factory dormitory that was fenced in and guarded, prosecutors said.
Trinh Thi Hao, a former Daewoosa seamstress, took the witness stand and told the court she used her home in Vietnam as collateral and borrowed money to pay the $5,000 fee required to work at the company.
The money went to Daewoosa and a Vietnamese government-owed labor export company, International Manpower Supply, she said.
On Nov. 28, 2000, Lee ordered a mass beating of Vietnamese workers who did not work or follow directions, French said. In the ``vicious attack,'' one worker had her eye gouged out, she said.
``I remember that day. I was beaten,'' Hao testified.
If workers complained about the conditions or about not getting paid, they would be deported back to their countries, where they would be saddled with heavy unpaid debts, prosecutors said.
Lee's public defender, Alexander Silvert, said workers were upset by contractual problems with International Manpower Supply, leading them to start work slowdowns, or refuse to work outright.
``They challenged Mr. Lee,'' he said.
Solia`i's attorney, Pamela Tamashiro, told jurors that her client did only menial jobs at Daewoosa. Atimalala's attorney, Barry Edwards, said his client was a ``peacekeeper'' at the plant but was not involved in day-to-day operations.
Lee, 52, also is charged with extortion, money laundering and attempting to bribe a bank official to influence his application for a $500,000 loan.
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Involuntary Servitude Case Opens
By JAYMES SONG
.c The Associated Press
HONOLULU (AP) - The owner of an American Samoa garment factory had employees starved and beaten and threatened to have them deported if they spoke out about working conditions, a federal prosecutor told jurors.
``This case is about modern day slavery and this defendant's greed,'' federal prosecutor Susan French said during opening statements Wednesday in an involuntary servitude case.
Kil Soo Lee, of South Korea, and two of his managers, Virginia Solia`i and Robert Atimalala, were charged last year with holding hundreds of Vietnamese and Chinese workers in involuntary servitude at the Daewoosa Samoa Ltd. factory.
If convicted on all 22 counts, Lee faces up to 390 years in prison, Atimalala up to 80 years, and Solia`i up to 210 years. Dozens of witnesses are expected to take the stand in the trial, which could last up to five months.
Defense lawyers told jurors the plant had labor problems, in part because of language differences and financial difficulties. Atimalala and Solia`i's attorneys also said their clients had little or nothing to do with supervising employees.
The now-closed factory in the U.S. territory 2,300 miles south of Hawaii had made clothes for J.C. Penney and other retailers before the U.S. Labor Department reported worker abuses.
Workers had aspirations of the ``American dream'' for a better life, earning good benefits and sending money back to their families, prosecutors said, but what they discovered was the opposite.
Seamstresses, who were required to pay thousands of dollars to secure a job at Daewoosa, were housed in a factory dormitory that was fenced in and guarded, prosecutors said.
Trinh Thi Hao, a former Daewoosa seamstress, took the witness stand and told the court she used her home in Vietnam as collateral and borrowed money to pay the $5,000 fee required to work at the company.
The money went to Daewoosa and a Vietnamese government-owed labor export company, International Manpower Supply, she said.
On Nov. 28, 2000, Lee ordered a mass beating of Vietnamese workers who did not work or follow directions, French said. In the ``vicious attack,'' one worker had her eye gouged out, she said.
``I remember that day. I was beaten,'' Hao testified.
If workers complained about the conditions or about not getting paid, they would be deported back to their countries, where they would be saddled with heavy unpaid debts, prosecutors said.
Lee's public defender, Alexander Silvert, said workers were upset by contractual problems with International Manpower Supply, leading them to start work slowdowns, or refuse to work outright.
``They challenged Mr. Lee,'' he said.
Solia`i's attorney, Pamela Tamashiro, told jurors that her client did only menial jobs at Daewoosa. Atimalala's attorney, Barry Edwards, said his client was a ``peacekeeper'' at the plant but was not involved in day-to-day operations.
Lee, 52, also is charged with extortion, money laundering and attempting to bribe a bank official to influence his application for a $500,000 loan.
