Trafficking victim relives past trauma

Nedburn Thaffe, Gleaner Writer

Following reports that members of the Organised Crime Investigation Division (OCID) swooped down on an alleged human-trafficking ring last Friday, rescuing seven alleged victims, reports have surfaced pointing to downtown Kingston as a major labour trafficking hotbed.

On Friday, a team of OCID investigators, acting on intelligence and surveillance at specific business establishments over a three-month period, stormed five locations in the Corporate Area and St Catherine, where they rescued the alleged victims, all of whom were said to be of Indian descent.

One person was arrested on suspicion of human trafficking and another processed and released.

Yesterday, an individual with whom The Gleaner spoke, who is also of Indian descent, said he was willing to furnish investigators with evidence to show that downtown Kingston has been a den for labour traffickers for years.

Labour trafficking is a process through which persons are forced into indentured servitude by their traffickers. According to www.humantrafficking.org, a key sign that labour trafficking is taking place is when workers are being held against their own will.

The Gleaner source, whose name the newspaper has chosen to conceal for his own protection, claimed he was a victim of a labour-trafficking ring operating downtown.

Like others, he said he was recruited through an employment agency from his hometown in India in 2006. He was employed to manage an appliance store in the downtown area.

"They asked me to work for three years, after which they say I could go back to India. I went back in 2009, after which the same company called me and told me they would raise my pay."

He said the conditions around him started to change after his return to Jamaica, and that his passport was taken from him.

Lived with employers

"The money that they promised me, they did not pay it and sometimes I would go for months without pay," he claimed. "When I asked them for my money, they would either tell me that I am a thief, or I am not working hard enough."

He said that like many others, he lived at his employers' home in an upscale community.

Though not going into much detail about the treatment he received, he stressed that his employers were "wicked people".

He said that in December last year when he decided he would have no more of it, he attempted to part ways with his employers who threatened him and refused to return his passport.

After a series of legal wranglings, he claimed he was able to part ways with them and his passport was returned. He has now established his own company and settled in Jamaica.

"I want the police to know that this is going on," he declared.

Yesterday, Superintendent Fitz Bailey, head of OCID, told The Gleaner that while his office was aware that trafficking such as described by The Gleaner source was taking place, it was often difficult to get victims to confess to their involvement.

"We are aware of trafficking in such forms, but the problem is that many do not want to come forward," Bailey said. "Many are also under a strict regimental process and, as a result, their movement is restrained, so this is where we have a problem."

The OCID boss, however, called for the man with whom The Gleaner spoke and others with similar experiences to tell their story to the police.