Claims of Diplomats’ Mistreating Household Staff Are Far From the First - NYT
Sangeeta Richard, the housekeeper whose accusations of employer mistreatment led to the arrest of India’s deputy consul general in New York and an international furor, is not the first domestic worker to take issue with a diplomat who hired her.
About 20 domestic-worker trafficking lawsuits have been filed against diplomats and other foreign officials in the United States in the past decade in federal courts in New York, Virginia, the District of Columbia and elsewhere, a legal advocacy group says.
The employers have been accused of forcing their maids to work long hours at little or no pay, making them sleep on floors, shouting at them or threatening violence and other mistreatment, court records show. The diplomats were from Kuwait, the Philippines, Tanzania and other countries. Indian diplomats were accused in two suits in New York.
There have also been several criminal cases.
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