Date of publication: September 3, 2008
Source: Ft. Myers News-Press
Author: Amy Bennett Williams
Five Immokalee residents pleaded guilty in federal court Tuesday to charges of enslaving Mexican and Guatemalan workers, brutalizing them and forcing them to work in farm fields.
The 17-count indictment in the case - one of the largest slavery prosecutions Southwest Florida has ever seen - was originally released in January. It alleged that, for two years, Cesar Navarrete and Geovanni Navarrete held more than a dozen people in boxes, trucks and shacks on the family property, chaining and beating them, forcing them to work in farm fields in Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina while keeping them in ever-increasing debt...