Woman gets 5 years for enslaving nanny

[Judi Lynn]

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

Woman gets 5 years for enslaving nanny
Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer
Thursday, April 15, 2010


A Walnut Creek real estate agent was sentenced Wednesday to five years in federal prison for luring a Peruvian nanny to the East Bay with promises of a better life but instead enslaving her for nearly two years.

Mabelle de la Rosa Dann, 46, also known as Mabelle Crabbe, kept the nanny a virtual prisoner, cut her off from Spanish-speaking media, rationed her food and "mentally abused her through explosive tirades and degrading behavior," federal prosecutors wrote in court documents.

In addition to the prison term, U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken in Oakland ordered Dann to pay $123,740 in restitution and placed her on three years of supervised release.

Dann was found guilty in October by a federal jury of forced labor and other charges.





Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/04/15/BA041CUU3N.DTL

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http://sfist.com.nyud.net:8090/attachments/SFist_Brock/americanbeauty5.jpg

Mabelle de la Rosa Dann

Walnut Creek Real-Estate Agent Answers Nanny Exploitation Allegations
Taking a page from Karen Walker's handbook, Bay Area real-estate agent Mabelle de la Rosa Dann (AKA Mabelle Crabbe) is in federal court today on charges of coaxing a Peruvian nanny to her Walnut Creek home for a better life, but instead kept her as an "indentured servant for nearly two years."

Sheesh.

Some of the charges railed against Dann are: failing to pay her for her work, charging her around $15,000 for Dann's expenses in Peru including her costs for searching for nannies before she hired Pena-Canal, food rationing, threatening the nanny with deportation, explaining to her that "hen you come to the United States, you must suffer," and forcing her to live on the living room floor.

In April of this year, ran away from her job/prison after telling people at Indian Valley Elementary School about the nightmarish conditions.

Dann's ruling is eagerly awaited.

By Brock Keeling in News on November 19, 2008 11:46 AM

http://sfist.com/2008/11/19/taking_a_page_from_karen.php

[Judi Lynn]

1. Associated Press: Calif. woman sentenced in forced labor case

Apr 15, 12:03 AM EDT
Calif. woman sentenced in forced labor case
By JULIANA BARBASSA
Associated Press Writer

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) -- A woman convicted of luring a Peruvian to the United States with promises of job then confiscating her travel documents and forcing her to work for no pay was sentenced to six years in prison Wednesday.

Maribel de la Rosa Dann was found guilty of forced labor and related charges for keeping Zoraida Pena-Canal enslaved as a household servant from summer of 2006 to the spring of 2008. Dann, a real estate agent in the affluent suburb of Walnut Creek, was also ordered to serve three years of supervised released, and ordered to pay $123,740 in restitution for back wages not paid.

Pena-Canal has a civil case pending in which she is seeking to recover the costs of her labor, emotional distress and other damages.

The victim did not want to speak in court, but in a written statement she told others who might be enduring similar circumstances, "Do not be afraid and do not be ashamed. Seek help and fight for the justice you deserve."

Attorneys and advocates said that while the public may be more familiar with human trafficking victims who are forced into prostitution, cases of forced labor like Pena-Canal's are also widespread.

"This case accurately captures the face of human trafficking now, as we see it in contemporary society," said Kathleen Kim, a professor at Loyola Law School specializing in human trafficking.

According to court testimony, Pena-Canal cared for Dann's children and did other household chores from early morning to late at night without breaks, while sleeping on the living room floor and eating food rationed by her employer. She was not allowed contact with her family or access to news.

More:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_HUMAN_TRAFFICKING_DOMESTIC_WORKER?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2010-04-14-16-54-16

[DeSwiss]

2. "...and placed her on three years of supervised release."

:shrug: - WTF?

K&R

[SergeStorms]

3. That's AFTER her prison sentence............

is fulfilled. That threw me for a loop as well, until I read the story more closely, that is. Of course she'll probably only serve 6 months of the original sentence: good behavior, and all that. :eyes:
I imagine these are all good republican women. If they got a sympathetic republiCON judge who knows what the sentence might have been? :shrug:

[No Elephants]

4. Only 5 years? The ban on slavery is not only a criminal statute. It's in the U.S.Constitution, ffs.

And, unlike other rights, government is not only actor constrained by the Constitution in the case of the right to be free of slavery:

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.<1>



Those two things are not true of any other crime I can think of, including murder. Six years? Seriously? And, shouldn't the victim at least get all the property that this turd owns, plus return of her $15,000, plus back wages for two years, plus punitives damages?

What's wrong with Congress, writing laws that provide for anything less?

BTW, not for nutin,' but I watched Will and Grace. I don't recall anything about Rosario's being a slave, so fuck the Brock Keeling (author of the OP article) for falsely equating slavery with a sitcom character in a tone deaf attempt to be "witty" about slavery. Some things just aren't funny. Deprivation of human rights is one of those things.

[rfranklin]

5. It would seem that there is a civil rights violation here...

and that this woman could be sued for millions.

[Bradical79]

6. She got minimum wage

Those damages awarded are pathetic. Anyone notice it works out to about two years of only minimum wage calculated at 24 hour shifts?

[Solly Mack]

7. k/r

[Stuart G]

8. K and R

[Rosa Luxemburg]

9. I'm sure that there are many other cases like this that we don't know about

it's terrible

[amyrose2712]

10. ...

[Jefferson23]

11. Enjoy prison Mabelle, every minute of every day, you swine. n/t

[slackmaster]

12. That's hot

:sarcasm:

[Uncle Joe]

13. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, Judi Lynn.

[closeupready]

14. That's what you get.

K&R