By Frank Luba, The Province
As the accidental result of a 911 call, Vancouver police discovered a woman was allegedly being forced into domestic servitude for two years.Const. Jana McGuinness said police launched an investigation into a Vancouver couple after being called in June of last year to a residence in the 3100-block Grant Street, which is just across the street from Sir Matthew Begbie Elementary School in east Vancouver.
Police said Wednesday that couple, who had come to Canada from Hong Kong with the victim, were charged in May under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act for organizing illegal entry into Canada.
Oi Ling Nicole Huen and Franco Yiu Kwan Orr are due back in provincial court on June 22.
But the 911 call had nothing to do with the domestic servitude charges, which alleges the 38-year-old Filipino victim was forced to work 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
McGuinness said it’s normal practise for police to interview everyone in a home when there’s been a 911 call.
She declined to identify the nature of that 911 call but said “we’ll check the background of people involved.”
One of those people was the victim.
“We realized the person was in the country illegally,” said McGuinness.
The result was an investigation by the vice squad and the charges announced Wednesday.
McGuinness said the woman knew the family she was ‘working’ for in Hong Kong and came to Canada with them in 2008. But she wasn’t in possession of her passport and was in Canada on an expired visitor visa — essentially trapped in the home.
“She did not have access to the passport,” said McGuinness.
The woman, who is still living in Canada, was afraid to go to authorities for fear of deportation.
“This is one of first cases of this kind we have dealt with,” said McGuinness.
But this is not the first case of domestic servitude in the Lower Mainland.
It was revealed in May that a West Vancouver women, Mumtaz Ladha, is wanted on a warrant for one charge of human trafficking and one charge of human smuggling. She allegedly hiring a 21-year-old woman from Africa to work in a hair salon but instead made her work as maid for 18 hours a day, seven days a week, for no pay.
Ladha, 55, was investigated by the RCMP’s Federal Border Integrity Program for two years. She was last believed to be in Tanzania, where she owned a hair salon.
RCMP said Wednesday the investigation is still under way.
Vancouver couple charged with keeping woman in domestic slavery
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