Sentenced: ‘Modern-Day Equivalent Of Slavery’: Family Put Woman Into Forced Labor For 12 Years

[Sugar Cookie]

Members of a Virginia family were convicted and found guilty of using coercive measures to hold a woman against her will and work under unbearable conditions in their home for more than 12 years.

Zahida Aman, 80, and two of her sons, Mohammed Naumann Chaudhri, 54, and Mohammed Rehan Chaudhri, 48, were all convicted on charges pertaining to forced labor.

Nexstar’s WRIC previously reported on the family’s 2019 indictment, which alleged that the family members “conspired to force” a woman to clean their home — in Midlothian, Virginia — and provide services from March 2002 until August 2014.

The Department of Justice said the victim, who is originally from Pakistan, had married one of Aman’s sons — a brother of Naumann Chaudhri and Rehan Chaudhri, who was not identified in court records — through an arranged marriage in 2002, and thereafter lived in the family’s home. Over the next 12 years, she was forced to perform domestic services, such as cleaning the home, painting the house and mowing the lawn, all while under the coercion of physical, verbal and psychological abuse.

“The defendants exploited the victim’s trust and inflicted cruel and inhumane physical and mental abuse on her, all so they could keep her working in their home as their domestic servant,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke. “Human trafficking is a disgraceful and unacceptable crime.”

In addition to forced labor, Justice Department records say the defendants locked the victim out of the home for hours on one occasion, but when she tried to run away, they would forcibly bring her back to the house. The three also confiscated the victim’s immigration documents, lied to her about her immigration status, threatened her with deportation and restricted her ability to talk with anyone outside or inside of the home.

The three family members also limited the victim’s interactions with her four children, and on at least one occasion, required some of the children to abuse their mother. The defendants told school officials the children’s parents lived out of state, and made themselves the primary guardians.

‘Modern-day equivalent of slavery’: Family members put woman into forced labor for 12 years, DOJ says

Members of a Virginia family were convicted and found guilty of using coercive measures to hold a woman against her will and work under unbearable conditions in their home for more than 12 years.

www.wkrg.com

 

[cubby]

That bitch in the middle, yeah she's scary looking.

 

[The All Seeing Eye]

Zahida Aman masks are certain to be a hit this Halloween

 

[Hermy]

And, of course, her FORTY-EIGHT and FIFTY-TWO year old sons went along with this???

GROW UP YOU OVER-FED TROLLS!!!

 

[The All Seeing Eye]

That bitch in the middle, yeah she's scary looking.

and a TRANS_GENDER

 

[Sugar Cookie]

A federal court in Richmond, Virginia, sentenced three defendants today for conspiracy to commit forced labor for compelling the domestic labor of a Pakistani woman for 12 years.

Zahida Aman, 80, was sentenced to 144 months in federal prison, Mohammed Rehan Chaudhri, 48, to 120 months in federal prison and Mohammad Nauman Chaudhri, 55, to 60 months in federal prison in the Eastern District of Virginia. Additionally, the Court ordered Aman and Rehan Chaudhri to pay the victim $250,000 in restitution for back wages and other financial losses she incurred as a result of the defendants’ criminal conduct.

Following a seven-day trial in May 2022, the jury convicted all of the defendants of conspiracy to commit forced labor, convicted two of the defendants of forced labor and convicted Aman of document servitude. Aman arranged for her son’s marriage to the victim in 2002, but even after the victim’s husband moved away from the home, the defendants kept the victim in their Virginia home to serve the extended family.

“These defendants callously exploited the victim’s vulnerabilities and brutally coerced her labor through physical violence and emotional abuse,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “Human trafficking is an affront to human rights and to our nation’s core values. The Department of Justice is committed to vindicating the rights of survivors and bringing human traffickers to justice.”

According to the evidence presented in court, the defendants compelled the victim to serve the family as a domestic servant, using physical and verbal abuse, restricting communication with her family in Pakistan, confiscating her immigration documentation and money and eventually threatening to separate her from her children by deporting her to Pakistan. The defendants slapped, kicked and pushed the victim, even beat her with wooden board, and on one occasion hog-tied her hands and feet and dragged her down the stairs in front of her children. All of these coercive means were employed by the defendants to compel the victim’s labor in their home.

The evidence further showed that the defendants required the victim to work every day, beginning early each morning. They restricted her food, forbade her from learning to drive or speaking to anyone except the defendants’ family members and prohibited her from calling her family in Pakistan.

Virginia Family Sentenced for Conspiracy for Years-Long Forced Labor of Pakistani Woman

A federal court in Richmond, Virginia, sentenced three defendants today for conspiracy to commit forced labor for compelling the domestic labor of a Pakistani woman for 12 years.

www.justice.gov