Child labor in Seattle: Mexican girl kept in near slavery – seattlepi.com

Photo: U.S. District Court

Federal prosecutors claim "C."was basically a slave, put to work by relatives -- includingMiguel Arcef-Flores, left, and Marbella Sandoval Mondragon --who had promised her a better life in America. They collected the wages she was paid by temp agencies that provided workers to factories, while leaving her hungry and trapped at a Federal Way apartment.

Federal prosecutors claim "C."was basically a slave, put to work by relatives -- includingMiguel Arcef-Flores, left, and Marbella Sandoval Mondragon --who had promised her a better life in America. They

Investigators contend "C.," 14-year-old Mexican girl, was forced to work at this Kent commercial bakery as well as several other factories around the Seattle area.

Investigators contend "C.," 14-year-old Mexican girl, was forced to work at this Kent commercial bakery as well as several other factories around the Seattle area.

Federal prosecutors in Seattle say a teen girl was forced to work at King County factories to pay immigration "debts." They say she was kept at this Federal Way apartment building.

Federal prosecutors in Seattle say a teen girl was forced to work at King County factories to pay immigration "debts." They say she was kept at this Federal Way apartment building.

Child labor in Seattle: Mexican girl kept in near slavery

Sometimes C. forgets her birthday.

She used to know it. Growing up outside Mexico City, it was not hard to remember her birthday. That changed when her uncle brought her, at age 14, to the United States.

Once in the U.S., C. was presented with forged green cards, Social Security papers and a string of bogus birth dates. Theyre hard to keep straight.

Who gave you many birth dates? Assistant U.S. Attorney Catherine Crisham asked C. during a Tuesday hearing at U.S. District Court in Seattle.

The accused, said C., facing her uncle, Angel Sandoval Mondragon, and three others who admitted to harboring her as she worked illegally at industrial bakeries south of Seattle.

Federal prosecutors claim C. was basically a slave, put to work by Sandoval, his sister, Marbella Sandoval Mondragon, and her husband, Miguel Arcef-Flores. They collected the wages she was paid by temp agencies that provided workers to South King County factories, while leaving her hungry and trapped at a Federal Way apartment.

The Sandovals and Arcef were sentenced Wednesday following a contentious three-day hearing. Prosecutors claimed their crimes extended far beyond the charge each pleaded to, conspiring to bring in and harbor an alien. Attorneys for the three defendants argued that C. greatly exaggerated their conduct to impress police.

Arcef, 42, was sentenced to more than three years in prison, while Angel Sandoval, 37, and Marbella Sandoval, 38, received slightly shorter prison terms. Each is expected to be deported.

The defendants promised the world, and then stole the childhood of a 14-year-old girl, U.S. Attorney Annette L. Hayes said in a statement. They preyed on a vulnerable relative for their own selfish and depraved reasons.

C. now has legal status in the United States through a program that provides visas to human trafficking victims. The visa allows her to stay in the United States for up to four years.

The allegations against Arcef and Marbella Sandoval include claims of sexual abuse. Seattlepi.com does not identify alleged victims of sexual assault absent a request from the alleged victim.

Like the Sandovals and Arcef, C. never had legal status in the United States. The Sandovals and Arcef entered the country illegally in the early 2000s, settling on the Washington coast.

They were living in Aberdeen in December 2004 when Angel Sandoval was caught by the U.S. Forest Service working in the woods near Vancouver. He was deported to Mexico four days later.

Angel Sandoval soon set about returning, this time with C. She was to join him, his wife and a cousin in Aberdeen.

Angel put (her) on the phone with Marbella and Miguel, both of whom promised her that she would have a wonderful life with them in the United States, that she could go to school, and that they would treat her like their own child, Crisham said in court papers.

Excited by the prospect of a better life, C. pressured her family to let her follow Angel Sandoval back to the United States. She and her mother paid Angel Sandoval to cover the costs of the trip, which saw them hire a coyote to smuggle them across the U.S.-Mexico border.

Arriving in Aberdeen in the spring of 2005, C. was told she owed her hosts thousands of dollars. Rather than enroll in school, she was put to work.

C. worked as a maid and nanny, then at temporary staffing agencies that provided workers to factories. She worked at industrial kitchens for eight months, making pies and chocolates sold in the Seattle area. Her workplaces included Plush Pippin and Seattle Gourmet Food, where she was paid through a temp agency.

Attorneys for the defendants dispute the claim, but prosecutors say the Sandovals and Arcef pocketed C.s earnings. They kept her fake IDs, preventing her from cashing the checks herself.

According to prosecutors, C. and another girl living with the Sandovals and Arcef were sick and starving.

They refused to provide them with sufficient food and other basic needs, including medical and dental care, wrote Crisham, who prosecuted the case alongside Assistant U.S. Attorney Bruce Miyake.

C. slept on the floor while everyone else in the apartment had a bed. She and her 12-year-old cousin were forced to shower together in cold water and derided as lesbians by the Sandovals and Arcef for doing so.

One man, worried the girls were being abused, took his concerns to the pastor of a church where Arcef also preached. His complaint went unheeded.

Prosecutors claim Arcef sexually abused C.s cousin; as part of a plea agreement with Arcef, federal prosecutors agreed to urge King County prosecutors not to pursue additional criminal charges against him.

According to prosecutors statements, Marbella Sandoval touched the girls inappropriately and forced them to eat printed pornography belonging to her husband. She and the other defendants, Crisham said, taunted and laughed at the girls while they ate and gagged on the pages.

The girls were sent back to Mexico in the spring of 2006. C. had been fainting at work, and the temp agencies stopped hiring her.

C. returned to the United States the following year, coming back to Washington. The Sandovals, Arcef and others demanded she pay them $10,000 a sum well beyond her means as a minimum-wage worker and spread personal medical information about her to members of their church.

That time, though, a pastor at the church recognized the abuse and, in May 2008, went to the police. Investigators with the Federal Way and Kent police departments took up the matter, as did the Department of Social and Health Services. The investigation was dropped, though, after investigators could not find C. or her cousin.

Five years later, a Federal Way Police Department detective investigating other sexual abuse allegations against Arcef interviewed C., by then a young woman living in the Seattle area. In that case, Arcef, now 42, had sexually assaulted a 5-year-old girl.

Troubled by the unrelated allegations C. made against the Sandovals and Arcef, the Federal Way detective contacted members of a Homeland Security Investigations human trafficking task force. An extensive investigation followed, culminating in a human trafficking indictment delivered Dec. 5, 2015.

The Sandovals and Arcef pleaded guilty to reduced charges late last year. Monica Arcef-Flores Angel Sandovals wife, and Miguel Arcefs sister had previously pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor immigration charge.

The Sandovals and Miguel Arcef tendered guilty pleas to felony offenses, but they and prosecutors did not agree on the extent of their crimes.

Little evidence was presented showing where C.s earnings had been deposited. She had made statements to investigators that proved false, and the seven-year gap between the alleged forced labor and the prosecution made records difficult to come by.

U.S. District Judge James Robart presided over a three-day evidentiary hearing meant to challenge both sides claims. The adversarial hearing meant C. had to endure an indignity usually reserved for crime victims whose assailants have risked additional prison time by taking their claims to a jury.

Defense attorneys picked apart C.s statements to police to weaken her claims of abuse. They pressed Seattle Police Department Detective Megan Bruneau, one of the lead investigators on the case, about C.s honesty as well.

A particularly hostile exchange between Bruneau and Marbella Sandovals defense attorney, Michael Martin, soured as Martin patronizingly asked Bruneau a veteran vice and human-trafficking detective assigned to a Homeland Security Investigations task force how long she had been a police officer.

From the witness stand, though, Bruneau described C. as a young woman who had survived tremendous abuse.

What has been very clear to me since the day I met her has been her fear of the defendants, Bruneau said from the stand, addressing a skeptical Martin.

Did you ever count up the number of people (she) said she was abused by? Martin asked the detective as they continued to spar.

No."

Would you say it is a large number?

Id say it is an unfortunate number.

If the exchange had any impact on the Sandovals or Arcef, they didnt show it. Dressed in brown jail uniforms and wearing translation headsets, each sat impassively, flanked by their attorneys, as C. and Bruneau made their claims.

The defendants each requested sentences that would have seen them released for deportation nearly immediately. Robart opted to impose sentences that will likely see them transferred to federal prison before they are returned to Mexico.

Brad Bench, special agent in charge from Homeland Security Investigations in Seattle, said he hopes the prison term will deter others who traffic in human beings.

No one should be forced to live in a world of isolation, servitude and terror as this young victim was, particularly in a country that prides itself on its freedoms, Bench said in a statement. Its a sad reflection on human greed and heartlessness, that people believe they can engage in this kind of egregious exploitation with impunity.

The Sandovals remain jailed, as does Arcef.

Seattlepi.com reporter Levi Pulkkinen can be reached at 206-448-8348 or levipulkkinen@seattlepi.com. Follow Levi on Twitter attwitter.com/levipulk.

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Child labor in Seattle: Mexican girl kept in near slavery - seattlepi.com