Feds charge 3 south suburban family members with child labor trafficking


An African national and two of her daughters are accused of taking two undocumented West African girls to the United States under false pretenses and forcing them to work in the south suburbs under threat of serious harm.

The three women, all residents of the south suburbs, were indicted last month and arraigned in U.S. District court this week. All three pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiring to harbor aliens, harboring aliens for private financial gain and forced labor.

The trafficking scheme dates back to 2014, when Nawomi Awoga, 71, a citizen of Benin and resident of Hazel Crest, brought two girls, ages 12 and 14, from Benin to the U.S. on falsified six-month tourist visas, prosecutors alleged.

The girls, who had left their families to live with Awoga in Benin three months before coming to the U.S., were coached by her to lie to U.S. Customs officials about their family relationships and names in order to obtain visas, according to prosecutors.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/subur...urq-story.html


Suburban family threatened West African teens into forced labor: feds


A south suburban family faces child labor trafficking charges after allegedly threatening two undocumented West African teenagers into forced labor.

Nawomi Awoga, 71, and her two daughters allegedly got tourism visas for two teens from the African country Benin, where Awoga is a citizen, according to an indictment from the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago.

The teenage girls, then ages 12 and 14, were kept at the defendants’ homes in Country Club Hills and Hazel Crest and forced to work for the financial gain of the defendants, according to the indictment. The defendants allegedly instructed the teens to lie to customs agents and say they were sisters.

Prosecutors don’t detail the type of work the teens were forced to perform, or the type of threats allegedly used to coerce them. The victims were allegedly kept against their will between June 2014 and October 2018.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/crime/2...icking-charges