Ukrainian brothers convicted in human-trafficking case

Two Ukrainian brothers were found guilty Wednesday of running a ring that used Eastern European immigrants as slaves to clean suburban big-box stores.

Omelyan Botsvynyuk, 52, and Stepan Botsvynyuk, 36, were on trial for a month in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia on federal charges of conspiring to engage in racketeering and extortion.

Both men were found guilty of one count of conspiracy. Omelyan Botsvynyuk was also found guilty of one count of extortion. The jury found Stepan Botsvynyuk not guilty of extortion.

Omelyan Botsvynyuk faces up to life in prison, prosecutors said. Stepan Botsvynyuk could be sentenced to up to 20 years' imprisonment.

Prosecutors argued that starting around 2001, the men were key participants in a human-trafficking operation involving about 30 victims that operated until 2007.

Using a route that stretched from Ukraine to Mexico, Los Angeles, and then to this region, the workers were brought in illegally, and then were allegedly beaten and threatened to keep them in indentured servitude.

They worked 16-hour days for little pay, say prosecutors. At least one female immigrant was raped by Omelyan Botsvynyuk, according to the grand jury indictment, handed up in June 2010.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel A. Velez said the brothers were part of an organization that forced the illegal immigrants into "debt bondage," cleaning stores such as Target, Kmart, Wal-Mart, and Safeway for the Botsvynyuks' company.

"The verdict is a just vindication of seven years of hard work, especially by the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security," Velez said. "This encourages my office and the investigative agencies to continue looking into these types of cases."

Asked about the harm done to the victims, Velez said, "They live in fear. They live in fear of the defendants and the defendants' associates."

Omelyan Botsvynyuk was arrested in Berlin last year and extradited to the United States to stand trial. Three other brothers were also charged with participating in what prosecutors call the Botsvynyuk Organization. Their cases await resolution.

The younger Botsvynyuk's defense attorney, Joshua Briskin, had told jurors that discrepancies and commonsense contradictions in the testimony of government witnesses justified acquittal.

The older Botsvynyuk's attorney, Howard Popper, said prosecution witnesses lacked credibility and testified in the hope of getting "T visas" to remain in this country. Those visas are given to victims of human trafficking.

Eight of the workers, six men and two women, cooperated with the government.

Some of the Botsvynyuks concocted a fake political party that they claimed was being persecuted in Ukraine in order to win asylum here.

Human-trafficking trials are not common, but immigrant-rights groups estimate that more than 14,500 people a year are brought into the United States to work as virtual peons.

Many of the illegal immigrants came from the same region of Ukraine as the Botsvynyuk brothers, and in at least some cases knew the men before coming to the United States. Defense attorneys said that suggested that whatever the working conditions were here, the brothers never intended to treat their workers brutally.