Report: Slavery Alive and Well in Florida

[mindem]

Must be part of the * Jobs and Growth program

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Modern-day slavery is alive and well in Florida, the head of a human rights center said Tuesday as it released a report on people forced to work as prostitutes, farmworkers and maids across the state.

Human traffickers bring thousands of people into the United States each year and Florida is believed to be one of the top three destinations, along with New York and Texas, according to the Center for the Advancement of Human Rights at Florida State University.

More

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=519&e=10&u=/ap/20040225/ap_on_re_us/human_trafficking

[sonias]

1. Yes this is America folks

Our own government and law enforcement agencies hardly make a dent in human trafficking right here in America. Cheap forced labor indeed. I'm sure the traffickers contribute money to protect their rackets. It's the cost of doing business, the corporate way of life.

Sick bastards.

Sonia

[Judi Lynn]

2. Florida has a hideous history of exploiting poor workers

Here's a quick grab from google:

(snip)
Slavery case in Florida results in convictions


30 August 2001

Michael Allen Lee recruited homeless men from the streets of Orlando or other cities to work in Florida's citrus fields with promises of good wages. However, instead of the US$35 to $50 a day that workers in the citrus industry could normally expect, Lee's workers were rarely paid more than $10 a day despite working from dawn to dusk.

Lee would deduct the cost of food, a place to sleep and other "expenses", such as charges for the sacks they used to collect the fruit, from their wages. One worker had $110 deducted from his weekly wage for food and rent alone. This despite the fact that the official charge for the bunk or mattress where they slept was $30 a week and that they only received between $5 and $10 a day for food. Those who complained or tried to escape were threatened with violence.

One worker, George E. Williams, did escape and went to the police. Williams had previously been beaten unconscious by Lee, dragged to a pick up truck and taken to another location where he was beaten again. Lee then made Williams wipe his own blood off the walls.

Seven months after Williams' escape he and more than a dozen other workers filed a lawsuit, with the assistance of Florida Rural Legal Services, against Lee and the company that hired him, Beville II Inc.
(snip/...)

http://www.antislavery.org/homepage/news/florida300801.htm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Almost every year, a new large, horrid case comes up. The really enormous one concerned the abuse of workers from the Caribbean, by the Spanish brothers Fanjul, whose family used to own sugar plantations in Cuba. They moved their operations to Florida (on land reclaimed from swamp by the U.S. Army which is currently poisoning the Everglades) and the Dominican Republic.( Bush's father spent some time at their Dominican Republic resort not long ago, along with the Coup President from Venezuela, Pedro Carmona, and, some say, the impeached previous Venezuelan President, Carlos Andres Perez.)

Their savage misuse of their employees was illuminated for U.S. audiences by CBS in a long documentary, and they were taken to court for just a fragment of their rapacious abuses of the poor workers.

Isn't it odd that these slavery cases just NEVER get cleaned up in Jeb's state?