by Deb Cupples | Executives at our nation's large corporations are paving the way for a huge, cheap labor pool by looting the companies they work for and laying off lower employees. According to the Justice Department, small businessman in Texas found a different way of getting cheap labor:
"Maximino Mondragon, 57, was sentenced today for his role in a scheme to smuggle Central American women and girls into the United States and to hold them in a condition of forced labor in the Houston area. U.S. District Judge Vanessa D. Gilmore sentenced Mondragon to 156 months incarceration, three years post release supervision, $200 special assessment and further ordered that he, jointly with his co-defendants, pay $ $1,715,588.05 in restitution to the victims.
"Maximino Mondragon is the last of eight defendants to be convicted and sentenced in connection with this scheme to compel the victims into service in restaurants, bars and cantinas, using threats to harm the victims and their families if they attempted to leave before paying off their smuggling debts."
"Mondragon previously pleaded guilty to violations of conspiracy to hold persons in a condition of indentured servitude and to illegally and knowingly recruiting, harboring, transporting persons for labor and services, and conspiracy to bring, harbor, and transport known illegal aliens for purposes of commercial advantage and private financial gain.
"The defendants lured Central American women to the United States with promises of good jobs. However, once the young women arrived, they were forced to work in the defendants’ bars and cantinas selling high-priced drinks to male customers. The women were subjected to threats of harm to them and their families in order to compel their servitude." (DoJ)
One cannot help but wonder if forced sex or prostitution were involved -- especially given that some of the women were forced to sell "selling high-priced drinks to male customers."
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