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This is how the victims lived and worked

Three houses that functioned as clandestine workshops in Bajo Flores, will be auctioned by the State to financially compensate the victims of labor and sex trafficking. These are workshops that operated on Calle Cajaravilla 4675 and 4726, where 34 men and women of Bolivian nationality were subjected, with their children, all minors. With 17-hour workdays, the victims worked and lived in overcrowded conditions. A tour of these houses allows us to reconstruct how they lived.

For this reason a man and his four children are being processed with preventive detention. As determined by the court, the organization headed by Kjara Moisés Aliaga and his children Edwin Manuel Aliaga Carlo, Paola Ximena Aliaga Carlo, Oscar Emanuel Aliaga Carlo and Olivia Leonor Aliaga Carlo aimed to maximize the economic benefit obtained from the production and marketing of ready-made clothing by Bolivian workers, who were subjected to precarious conditions and deprived of their freedom. The production of the clothing was then commercialized in premises located in the commercial center of Avellaneda avenue in this city.

But meanwhile, after judicial endorsement, the State Property Administration Agency (AABE), led by Martín Cosentino, assumed custody of those properties so that they could be auctioned. As reported to Infobae lthe spokesmen of the case, the proceeds of the proceeds are delivered to the victims of labor and sex trafficking.

The cause

The complaint was filed in 2017 by the prosecutor Marcelo Colombo, head of the Prosecutor’s Office for Trafficking and Exploitation of Persons (PROTEX) and processed in federal court 2, by Sebastián Ramos.

Throughout the investigation, the existence of an organization that hides, under a complex network of companies, the purpose of maximizing the economic benefit obtained from the production and commercialization of clothing made by Bolivian workers, subjected to overcrowded conditions, was determined. precariousness, deprived of their freedom and reduced to servitude.

The processing, to which you agreed Infobae, it detailed “the production of the clothing was then commercialized in premises located in the commercial center of Avenida Avellaneda in this city.” During the raids, people were found living in a precarious situation and “sewing machines, rolls of cloth, wadding, metal zippers, threads and other sewing items” were seized, as well as “a large quantity of garments – mainly country ones-, various documentation, notebooks with notes, Argentine pesos, dollars, yuan, Bolivian pesos, food and cell phones ”. At least three of the people who were found inside the various residences searched – all of which were Bolivian nationals – declared that they had suffered labor exploitation.

The team of professionals from the National Program for Rescue and Accompaniment of People Damaged by the Crime of Trafficking reported that the individuals interviewed there found “were found in vulnerable conditions prior to their arrival at the workshop / houses raided; referring to having migrated to the Argentine Republic in search of jobs that would allow them to meet their needs and that of their families. “

The declarations. “We had no rest, we worked every day. We would get up at 5 or 6 in the morning […] they made me work at home […] They didn’t give me breakfast because they told me that I hadn’t made any progress, so I didn’t eat breakfast and sometimes I didn’t even have lunch, I gave him running. Many times I went without breakfast and without lunch. I just ate dinner at 12 o’clock at night, ”said one of the victims in the court case that Infobae agreed to.

A tour of the place where they lived and worked
A tour of the place where they lived and worked

Another of the victims said: “I locked myself in a room that had many jackets with clasps. I snapped from 5 in the morning until 10 at night. (…) They didn’t leave me any keys. They came to pick me up at 10 or 11 at night. I worked from Monday to Sunday. “

A third victim also claimed: “My son was locked up (…) all the time, playing with some toys, because he said that the children cannot be with you because we had to work […] Sometimes […] he took it [en referencia a M A K], to the laundry, to buy [..]I wear it, he told me, so that it doesn’t bother me so that I work more. Capable of abusing him […] he didn’t want to go with him (…) he was afraid.

There were more testimonies: “I managed to get E to let me have my son by my side while I worked at least until I started walking. When he started crawling, he forbade me to let the baby stay in the room, much less with me because he had to work, so Elena would wrap a ribbon around his waist and tie him to an iron that was in the yard, then my baby would pass it to him tied to that stick like an animal. “

infobae-image

The case

The organization’s operation consisted of exploiting workers of Bolivian origin in clandestine workshops, and then commercializing the garments in street stores under the brands “LeOt” and “AlicarKidsFashion”. The workers were locked in rooms for long hours, receiving a single meal a day, and threatened by their bosses to end the established productions. Both homes had bars on all doors and openings, thus ensuring that workers could not leave them.

Work in the workshops was slave labor: they were not allowed to go out on Sundays or Saturdays. They had no rest, they worked every day.

As Justice was able to reconstruct, the families were brought by the Aliaga clan from Bolivia with the promise of working in a textile workshop doing sewing tasks for a monthly salary of US $ 400. Although they were not informed of the work hours, or where the workshop was located, they were promised to learn a different trade than working on the land, where they would work comfortably and obtain an annual profit of US $ 10,000 and then return to their work. country of origin.

Once in Argentina, nothing matched that promise. They were taken to workshops from where they were not allowed to leave, except with the accompaniment of a member of the Aliaga family, who took them to a phone booth and made them tell their families that they were fine working in Argentina.

On the other hand, the salary was not what was offered in the first job offer, but once established they were told that they would be paid by giving them food and 300 Argentine pesos.

According to testimonies collected in the investigation, the work days began at 5 or 6 in the morning locked in different rooms. Many times they ran out of breakfast and had lunch advancing production until three in the morning, and then only slept for an hour because they were immediately knocked on the door so that they could continue working.

Once the production in the workshops was finished, the merchandise was transferred to the address of Bacacay 3591, located a few blocks from Avellaneda avenue where the stores were located for sale to the public. This address functioned as a distribution and stocking center for what was produced.

I kept reading:

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