Migrant workers from Vietnam have sued in U.S. federal court over being mistreated in America by Vietnamese companies.

 

The lawsuit targets International Investment Trade and Service group (Interserco) and General Automotive Industry Corp. of Vietnam (Vinamotors), both partly owned by the Vietnamese government. The companies are accused of charging individuals $7,000 to $15,000 to bring them to a Texas shipyard with the promise that they would earn $100,000 over a 30-month period while working as welders.

 

Instead, the workers were “housed like animals,” “treated like indentured servants” and fired after only eight months so the companies could replace them with more migrant laborers, according to the lawsuit seeking $100 million in punitive damages.

 

Some workers wound up in Pasadena, California, where two U.S.-based companies exploited the Vietnamese by charging $2,000 a month for slum housing and $1,200 monthly for transportation that amounted to little more than once-a-week trips to a grocery store. They were not given the opportunity to learn English and were not given access to television, newspapers or magazines.

 

The two companies, ILP Agency LLC of Louisiana and Coast to Coast Resources Management Services, formerly based in Houston, were ordered to pay the Vietnamese $60 million as a result of another civil case.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Were They ‘Indentured Servants'? (by Lisa Olsen, Houston Chronicle)

Vietnam Backs Human Traffickers and Forced Labor in U.S., Suit Says (by Cameron Langford, Courthouse News Service)

Thang Hong Luu v. International Investment Trade (U.S. District Court, Southern Texas, Galveston) (pdf)

Group of Foreign Workers Wants Chance to Stay (by Purva Patel, Houston Chronicle)