DOJ v. Alexander Villatoro Moreno

Alexander Villatoro Moreno pleaded guilty to conspiracy under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. According to DOJ, Villatoro Moreno and his co-defendants operated and managed Los Villatoros Harvesting (LVH), compelling victims to work in Florida, Kentucky, Indiana, Georgia and North Carolina. Villatoro Moreno and his co-defendants fraudulently recruited Mexican nationals to come into the United States on short-term, H-2A, agricultural visas. Villatoro Moreno and his co-defendants charged workers exorbitant recruitment fees to work for LVH and lied to the victims about how much they would be paid, the hours they would work, the working conditions and the reimbursement they would receive for paying recruitment fees and other expenses. The workers were then compelled to provide long hours of physically demanding agricultural labor, six to seven days a week, for far less pay than they were entitled to under the law. Villatoro Moreno obstructed the federal investigation by helping to prepare false payroll information to conceal underpayments to the workers and distributing fake reimbursement receipts to the victims to make it appear that LVH was complying with the law.

Summary generated from official Department of Justice press release