In the press – one after another – there appeared articles about various scandals, one way or another connected with “Russians” – from absurd story about Russian spies to sensational information about “raid” on medical offices, robbing the Medicare fund, and arrests of doctors, medical workers, patients – including Russian-speaking ones… But the most nightmarish story concerns not espionage or Medicare fraud, but human trafficking, that is, the importation of live goods into America, which is essentially a modern form of slavery.
Russian-speaking people in the U.S. have unfortunately not fared well of late.
Plenty of slaves for five brothers
The five brothers from Ukraine were Omelyan Botsvynyuk (aka Milo), Stepan Botsvynyuk (aka Stepa), Mykhaylo Botsvynyuk (Misha or Mykhaylo Churyuk), Dmytro Botsvynyuk, and Yaroslav Botsvynyuk (Slavko or Yaroslav Churyuk), as well as other people who were part of their criminal organization, which the prosecutor’s office tentatively calls the Botsvynyuk Organization, or BO, are accused of various offenses, but the main one is human trafficking. Each of the brothers had their own functions in BO, but its leader was Omelyan, who formed his organization in the fall of 2000….
The brothers are represented by the well-known Lawyer Bukh, whom we contacted to get his point of view on this sensational case. According to Bukh, his clients completely deny their guilt, and he is ready to defend them before the jury.
But first, let’s take a detailed look at the prosecution’s version of the case. According to the records of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania and the federal prosecutor’s office, the Botswiniuk brothers and others mercilessly exploited (in fact, enslaved) their compatriots, who were illegally brought to America, promising them decent jobs, good incomes and a normal roof over their heads.
The defendants had several businesses specializing in cleaning offices of various sizes and stores, including such well-known ones as Target, Kmart, Wal-Mart, Safeway, and others. The teams of cleaners, who worked mostly on the night shift, were made up of people the Botsvynyuk brothers recruited in their home country of Ukraine.
They were mostly young men, impoverished, unemployed, and fresh out of the army, but there were also women, also poor, who wanted to somehow feed themselves and their families. All these people were promised that they would earn between $300 and $500 a month, and they would not have to pay rent or move from Ukraine to the U.S., so they could earn up to $10,000 in three years of work.
The journey of the Ukrainians recruited by Botsvinyuky to America was long and dangerous. First, they were put on airplanes flying from Germany and Poland to Mexico. Here some were transported to California or Arizona across the Mexican border, while others were assigned to international airliners traveling between Mexico and Los Angeles. Some workers were given fake documents, others were simply dressed in American-made clothes and taught to say two magic sounds – US – if they were unlucky enough to run into border guards.
If the “travelers” were caught by the border guards and ended up in jail, the Botsviniuk brothers, with the help of their lawyers, would get them out of there, with the lawyers first instructing their new clients that they should pose as dissidents who had been persecuted in their home countries and had fled to the United States to seek political asylum. Eventually, the Botsviniuk brothers’ “charges” were released, setting a date for a hearing in the immigration courts, but of course they did not show up.
The main thing for the Botsvinyuk brothers was to somehow get the workers they hired to America, and from there to Pennsylvania, where the “headquarters” of the criminal group was located, they could be transported by buses or airplanes.
And then, finally, the workers arrived at their destination. Here, their attitude changed dramatically. First, they were informed that they owed a debt to the owners, i.e. the Botsvinyuk brothers, and the debt should be gradually paid, and the amount varied from 10 to 50 thousand dollars. And the workers were also informed that they would be working the night shift, as janitors, in different businesses, different cities and states – Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, as well as in the capital of our country – Washington, DC.
Uncle Omelian’s Cabin
The janitors were indeed provided with a roof over their heads, but these were not the promised decent apartments, but cramped, squalid apartments with no furniture and where people – five or six in one room – slept on the floor, on dirty mattresses. The Botsvyniuk brothers took away passports and other documents from all the people they imported so that they could not return to California and appear in immigration court. Thus, young Ukrainians, who dreamed of earning solid money in America and getting out of poverty, were turned into powerless people without documents, into illegal aliens, and even more precisely – slaves of the criminal organization BO. And, according to the prosecutor’s version, these slaves lived in an atmosphere of fear, threats and violence.
Such stinginess was explained by the same debt, until the full payment of which the “slaves” could not count on normal monetary compensation. Over time, they were not informed how much they had already paid or how much remained to be paid. The money given to the unfortunates was not even enough to feed them, and they often found other, additional work, secretly from their oppressors, and worked the hours they were supposed to sleep.
The prosecution claims that in order to control the forced Ukrainians, the Botsvynyuk brothers used ancient methods of “subduing” – threats, intimidation, and even beatings. People who reminded them of their original promises or complained about the nightmarish living and working conditions were mercilessly beaten with their fists and feet. Workers who tried to escape or who found other work and wanted to leave their oppressors were equally brutalized.
Often the “slaves” were told that if they shook their rights or tried to run away, the “masters” would take over their families in Ukraine and either physically kill them or impose a “tribute”, obliging them to pay the debts of their relatives. One of the workers was threatened that he would be killed and thrown into the ocean to be eaten by fish, another was assured that in case of disobedience his 8-year-old daughter would be forced to engage in prostitution and thus pay his debts. And one of the workers was brutally raped several times and kept in constant fear.
The road to a green card?
Eventually, some of BO’s victims managed to escape, contact law enforcement and inform them of their misadventures. According to the federal prosecutors’ version of the story, the Botswiniukis did contact the families of the “runaway slaves” in Ukraine afterward and threatened them with reprisals….
The U.S. federal prosecutor’s office hunted for the Botsvyniuk brothers together with Interpol, the German prosecutor’s office and the Canadian police. This joint operation was successful: Omelian was arrested in Germany, Stepan – in Philadelphia, Mikhailo and Yaroslav – in Canada. And only Dmytro Botsvyniuk managed to escape to Ukraine, which has not yet signed an extradition treaty with the United States.
If the Botsvynyuk brothers are found guilty, they face severe punishment. Omelyan could receive life imprisonment and a $750,000 fine, Stepan could receive 40 years in prison and a $500,000 fine, and Mykhailo, Dmytro and Yaroslav could receive 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
But they are presumed innocent until the court’s decision. Lawyer Bukh claims that most if not all of the “slaves” of the Botsviniuk brothers fabricate their testimony to obtain U-visas and S-visas, which are issued to victims of violence and witnesses of serious crimes, and on the basis of which green cards can eventually be obtained. When I asked whether the Bostvynyuk Organization is actually an honest business recruiting janitors for prominent American firms, Akradiy Bukh refused to answer.
Source: https://cripo.com.ua/scandals/?p=98331/