18 people plus company in dock
Eighteen people and a company have begun their trial at the Beja Court, accused of criminal association and the trafficking in human beings (among other offences) due to the alleged exploitation of immigrants on agricultural explorations in Portugal’s Alentejo region (a region that has been transformed, in recent years, by the influx of immigrants principally from Asia).
At the start of the trial, from which another company was excluded today because it no longer exists, the 17 official suspects present were identified (one was absent, with authorisation), more than a dozen of whom remain in pre-trial detention.
Under heavy security measures, both from the Public Security Police (PSP) and the Prison Guard Corps, the trial is taking place in the building of the former Civil Government of Beja. Two defendants spoke to the panel of judges, while another who expressed the same intention was due to speak this afternoon.
All suspects, most of whom are Romanian and Moldovan, have been indicted for a crime of criminal association and, as far as trafficking in human beings is concerned, five are charged with 20 offences, four with eight offences and eight with seven offences.
According to the preliminary trial hearing in the case, the company and several defendants have also been indicted for money laundering, and two defendants for possession of a prohibited weapon.
The case dates back to 23 November 2022, when the PJ judicial police carried out an operation in the district of Beja in which they detained 35 suspects “strongly suspected” of crimes of criminal association, trafficking in human beings, money laundering and document forgery, among others.
At the time, the PJ indicated that the suspects included “a criminal network dedicated to exploiting the labour of immigrant citizens”.
According to Jornal de Notícias (JN) newspaper, the defendants in this trial are part of the case originated by the November 2022 “mega-operation of the PJ’s National Counterterrorism Unit”.
Overall, the mega-case involves more defendants, but as the public prosecutor appealed to Évora Court of Appeal in relation to those who were “totally or partially exonerated” by the criminal investigating judge, that judge “ordered the separation of this case”, wrote JN, in a news item published on Sunday.
In today’s session, the presiding judge of the panel, referring to the indictment, said that the defendants had a plan, since 2020, in which they lured people to work on agricultural explorations in Portugal, promising them good salaries and accommodation and good working conditions, “a situation that was never fulfilled”.
“People ended up forced to work for little money” and with accommodation “in degrading and subhuman conditions”, with the “rent automatically deducted from their salary”, he said.
In this network, which according to JN “is accused by the public prosecutor of having exploited more than 60 citizens” from various countries, there were “three factions”, each led by some of the people who sat in the dock today, said the judge.
The two official suspects who spoke this morning, a mother and son who owned a company that, they claimed, only had ‘seven workers’, deny having committed any crimes.
Pedro Pestana, one of the defence lawyers in this case, confirmed that this is the “largest human trafficking case” he is aware of in Portugal – and he is confident that he will be able to prove his (Moldovian) client’s innocence.
His client “arrived in Portugal in 2020 and has already been a victim of human trafficking in another case (and) is now being accused” of human trafficking, while his partner “is being named as a victim” – all of which is “unreasonable”, he said.
“We have a case in which there is basically trawling. You catch the big fish, the small fish and what isn’t fish…” Pestana complained.
Source: LUSA
