Two Slavery-Related Cases Highlight a Growing Issue in Australia

Two Brisbane women and a Melbourne couple will face charges of keeping people in debt bondage and slavery after police raids rescued their captives.

This stock image illustrates the growing issues of debt bondage in Australia. cairoj/Depositphotos

A court order forfeiting a house so that the proceeds can pay fines for slavery and two women facing forced labour charges offer a glimpse into human trafficking in Australia.

Despite offenders being caught and sentenced to lengthy prison terms and losing their assets, and harsh warnings to would-be traffickers from police, the practice is still rife.

In the last financial year, the Australian Federal Police (AFP) received 12 reports of slavery and nine of debt bondage, part of 420 reports of human trafficking, which represented an increase of 10 percent on the previous year.

In the latest cases, a Victorian couple who enslaved a woman for eight years have had the proceeds of the sale of their home forfeited and been ordered to pay $140,000 in combined penalties to the Commonwealth.

The couple, a man, 61, and a woman, 58, were each found guilty in a jury trial in 2021 and sentenced to imprisonment for enslaving a woman from India who had entered Australia on a tourist visa.

The woman received a sentence of eight years (with parole eligibility in four), and the man was ordered to serve six years, with eligibility for parole in three.

The AFP-led Criminal Assets Confiscation Taskforce (CACT) had restrained the Mount Waverley house in 2016 under the Proceeds of Crime Act after the couple was first charged.

The house was sold that year for $1.4 million and, after paying the mortgage and sale expenses, the couple were left with about $475,000, which was held by the Official Trustee.

The Mount Waverley home which sold for $1.4 million in 2016. Proceeds from its sale went to the Commonwealth and the victim after the owners were convicted of enslaving a woman for eight years. Courtesy of AFP

About $485,000 in compensation was granted to the victim in 2023, and the CACT applied for monetary penalty orders over the remaining balance as additional punishment.

The woman has now agreed to pay $100,000, and the man to pay $40,000. They will also forfeit any accrued interest.

Once forfeited to the Commonwealth, proceeds from the sale of forfeited assets are placed into the Confiscated Assets Account, and can be distributed by the minister for home affairs to fund crime prevention measures, diversion programmes, or other law enforcement initiatives across Australia.

Human Trafficking Increasing

The AFP’s National Manager of Criminal Assets Confiscation, Fraud and Corruption, Stefan Jerga, said the case “highlights the unique breadth of the CACT’s work in targeting a wide range of criminal activity, including forced labour, and the importance of the Commonwealth’s Proceeds of Crime Act in preventing offenders from benefiting from their crimes.”

Human Trafficking Southern Command Team Leader Detective Sergeant Daisie Beckensall warned that “If you hold a person in domestic servitude, or commit other human trafficking offences, our investigators will work tirelessly to ensure offenders are found, put before the courts and remove victims from harm.”

However, that message doesn’t seem to be getting through, as illustrated not only by the jump in such crimes last year but also in individual cases such as the two Brisbane women, aged 39 and 40, who faced the Magistrates Court on Nov. 7, charged with forced labour and debt bondage offences.

Their alleged offending came to light after someone reported their Manly West restaurant to the Fair Work Ombudsman.

After an investigation, AFP’s Human Trafficking Team will allege in court that a woman was forced to undertake duties outside the scope of her employment at the restaurant, and allegedly received threats to her ongoing visa application, which the restaurant owners were sponsoring.

The AFP also claims the women charged their victim a $60,000 fee to sponsor her visa for permanent residency, and this debt was used as a further threat against her.

They have been charged with forced labour and debt bondage offences.

AFP Detective Superintendent Adrian Telfer said forced labour and debt bondage were tantamount to modern-day slavery.

“Debt bondage—forcing someone to work to repay an excessive debt—shows a similar key theme police often deal with, and that is preying on the vulnerable and the desperate,” he said.

“This is criminal behaviour, as it exploits the real value of the work someone is doing, which may not be applied to a debt, while debts can also grow if employers undervalue any work that is undertaken.

“It is important for police to crack down on debt bondage and instances of forced labour to protect victims, and we will continue to target those who seek to exploit vulnerable members of our community.”

He added it was important for migrant workers to know their rights, such as the fact that employers or sponsors do not hold any power to cancel workers’ visas.

“If your employer treats you poorly, and you make a report to the Fair Work Ombudsman, your visa will not automatically be cancelled, even if your employer sponsored you to come to Australia,” Telfer said.