6 charged in human trafficking scheme involving Thai workers

DirtySanchez

(CNN) -- Six job recruiters have been indicted in federal court in what the FBI has called the largest human-trafficking operation ever to result in charges in the United States.
An indictment unsealed in Hawaii on Thursday accuses employees of a California-based company of luring about 400 people from Thailand with false promises of lucrative jobs. Many of the imported workers wound up laboring on farms under substandard conditions, had their passports confiscated, and were threatened with deportation.
In one instance, several Thai workers allegedly were detained at a pineapple farm on Maui and told to pay an additional fee of $3,750 to keep their jobs. Those who refused were sent back to Thailand with unpaid debts.
"The object of the conspiracy was to obtain cheap, compliant labor," said the indictment, "indebted by the defendants' recruitment fees, and to compel the workers' labor and service through threats to have the workers arrested, deported, or sent back to Thailand."
The workers were brought to the United States under the federal H2-A visa program, which places foreign workers on U.S. farms. The case was investigated by the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division and the FBI in Honolulu, where many of the guest workers wound up.
Four of those charged worked for labor recruiting firm Global Horizons Manpower Inc., based in Beverly Hills, California. Two Thai-based recruiters also were charged. The operation allegedly began in May 2004.
Global Horizons President and CEO Mordechai Orian, 45, an Israeli national, was accused of leading the conspiracy. His attorney, Alan Diamante, did not return a message seeking comment. A call to the company was not answered.
FBI agents went to Orian's home with an arrest warrant Friday morning, but he was not at home, said Special Agent Tom Simon in Honolulu, Hawaii. He said agents have been in touch with Orian by telephone and are attempting to negotiate his surrender to authorities.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/09/03/hawaii.human.trafficking/index.html?hpt=T2

This isn't as bad as some of the sex trafficking cases. All they had to do was work. Ungrateful bastards imo.