>> This is a crime that hides
in plain sight. >> It's probably one
of these things that you just don't want
to know. >> NARRATOR: Immigrant teenagers
forced to work. >> They were kids like me,
14 and a half, 15. >> NARRATOR: At farms that feed
our families. >> They're vulnerable and easy
to victimize. And they're alone. "Frontline" takes you on
a journey from Central America to
the American heartland. >> We've got these kids. For us to just throw them
to the wolves, it's wrong. >> NARRATOR: Reporter Daffodil
Altan, from the UC Berkeley
Investigative Reporting Program, goes inside a criminal
conspiracy. >> ALTAN: Is Pablo someone you
would ever consider dangerous? >> I think he's like a rat in a
corner if you trapped him in it. >> NARRATOR:
"Trafficked in America." >> ALTAN: There are some things
we don't see. Not because they're not there, but because we don't always
understand what is right in front of us. >> I never heard of human
trafficking before. When I heard it, I thought,
like, sex slaves, immediately. I thought... I never heard of it
used in this type of way, where it was threats, with being
held against their will, you know, stuff like that. I've never heard it like this. No, this was the first time
I've ever heard of it. It this is the first time
I've heard of my dad ever doing stuff like that. I remember when I was working
there. I was 14 and a half, 14 and a
half, 15 at the time. So they were kids like me,
working like that. >> ALTAN: They were working
here, at Trillium Farms, in 2014, where workers described
conditions similar to this undercover footage taken
at other companies' plants around the country. >> (speaking Spanish): >> Usually we'd show up to the
site at about 6:00, and we wouldn't get done until
about 5:00. And we didn't get breaks. They could never sit down and, like, take a
half an hour break. It was maybe five minutes, tops. And they go and they drink some
water and their energy drinks and then go back to work. >> (speaking Spanish): >> I bought my trailer. There was holes in the walls. I guess they were using the
closets as spaces to sleep. Over here in the left... over
here in the right-hand corner, there's been mattresses. There was kids' shoes
underneath there. There was some clothing. It looked like someone was
recently sleeping there. I mean, I don't know how many
people were living here, but to me, it looked like they
were stuffing a lot of people in just a three-bedroom trailer. They had no running water. There was no toilet. No toilet. When I came in, there was a
five-gallon bucket. They had feces and stuff
already, that was already in there. So it was stinking up the whole
trailer. I mean, it was really nasty. It was like... maybe they were
being kidnapped or being held hostage or,
you know, maybe just like it
was in the back old days where they used to take them and
use them for slaves or something like that. That's pretty much what it
looked like to me. It didn't look like it was a
really good living environment-- it didn't at all. >> In our own country, we have,
today, a lot of victims of human trafficking that are
invisible to our own eyes. And let's not forget
that some of them are kids. And the end of the game is to
subject that person to peonage, to slavery. They're an easy prey. They're vulnerable and easy to
victimize and they're alone. >> ALTAN: In our years of
reporting on the exploitation of immigrant workers, we'd come across cases
of labor trafficking. But nothing quite like this one. Teenagers were being forced to
live and work like this in the middle of America,
and for months, no one did anything about it. Our investigation into how and
why this happened, and who was responsible,
would take us inside a criminal network
stretching from Ohio to Central America. The teens who ended up in Ohio
began their journey here, in the Western Highlands
of Guatemala. >> (speaking Spanish) >> ALTAN: One of the boys,
who was 14 at the time, lived in this village. He worked with his father
tending sugar cane for a dollar a day. >> ERLINDA: >> ALTAN: But then one day,
in 2014, a neighbor in the village
made them an offer. >> (speaking Spanish) >> ALTAN: Aroldo Castillo lived
just down the road. His mother told us he was known
for successfully smuggling adults to the U.S.
and finding them jobs. Now he was extending his offer
to local teenagers. >> ALTAN: The family said
Castillo told them he could get their son
and other teens to the U.S. for $15,000. He promised them jobs and
a chance to go to school, but they didn't have that kind
of money. >> ALBERTO: at least eight teens from thea
area took Castillo's offer, and like so many others
from the region, made the uncertain
journey north. We found some of the teens,
but they wouldn't speak to us on camera out of fear for
themselves and their families. Some would end up telling their
stories in court. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: The teens say Castillo
had a network of smugglers who moved them through Mexico
by bus, on foot, and on the infamous train known
as La Bestia-- "The Beast." >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Once they made
it to the U.S., most were detained
by the Border Patrol. At the time, the boys were among
tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors from
Central America who were fleeing violence
and poverty, and coming to the U.S.
in record numbers. They were turned over to the Department of Health
and Human Services, whose job it was to place them
with a relative or an adult sponsor. But HHS was overwhelmed, and
began to relax their standards for vetting. >> First, the federal government
decided to stop fingerprinting most of these sponsors who were
coming in to claim children. And then, over a period of
months later, they decided to stop requiring
that sponsors submit original or certified copies of
their birth certificates. And then finally,
they stopped requiring FBI criminal background checks
for many sponsors. >> ALTAN: Castillo took
advantage of the chaos. He had accomplices in Ohio
waiting to pose as sponsors for the boys. So in the summer of 2014, HHS
began releasing the teens, and they were brought to Ohio,
to trailers owned by Castillo. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: It was a farm
with a troubled past, going back decades
and across the country. Before Trillium,
it was owned and operated by one of the nation's biggest and most notorious egg
producers-- Jack DeCoster. >> Just down the road, the
chorus comes from thousands of hens packed into cramped
little cages. At Jack DeCoster's egg farm, human beings don't live
much better. I remember pitching it to my
news director, saying, "I want to do a story on
DeCoster egg farm." Nobody had ever been in there. We went over there with
the cameras and it was worse than I ever
could have imagined. >> Hello. >> The company owned
the trailers and the property that the
trailers were on. But DeCoster did no maintenance
on them. The people were crammed into
these little trailers, like, eight guys in one trailer
on broken bunk beds. There was raw sewage
on the ground. The plumbing and the pipes
were broken. It was nasty. It was awful. >> We will not tolerate
these abuses of working people
in the United States. The more I learned about Jack
DeCoster, the angrier I got. He was very much the most
egregious serial violator that I had ever seen. And the conditions on his farms
for migrant workers were among the worst sweatshops
I had, I had ever come across. >> ALTAN: In 1997, the
Department of Labor fined DeCoster $2 million for
violations at his facilities in Maine. But it didn't stop there. For years, authorities continued
to fine DeCoster for abuses against his workers. >> They couldn't escape, really. They couldn't leave. Once they were there,
they were stuck. Today we call it trafficking. But back then it was just
smuggling people in and treating them like slaves. >> As far as mistreating these
workers here, I don't... I don't want to mistreat
these workers, and I don't feel I've mistreated
these workers. >> But how did DeCoster get such
a bad name? >> I wish I... I'd like to know. (laughs) >> I think Jack felt the
conditions were better than what they're used to
in Mexico. You know, he was out for best
worker at the lowest price, and for him that was
a Hispanic worker. >> John Glessner worked with
DeCoster for more than 20 years. He ran some of his operations, and was known as his right-hand
man. DeCoster declined to be
interviewed, and Glessner has never before
spoken publicly about his experiences. >> I remember that John Glessner
was the business manager. He would never talk to us. We tried. He was one of those very
elusive figures at the DeCoster facility. His loyalty was to Jack DeCoster and to the profit
of that operation. >> ALTAN: Though they have since
fallen out and have sued each other,
Glessner played a critical role in building DeCoster's egg
empire, which stretched from Maine into Ohio
and here in Iowa. This was your former territory,
right? You were running...
you built all this, you were running all this. >> Yewas Jack's investment,you t and I oversaw, you know, a lot
of the construction and that of it. So, I mean, I basically lived,
lived and died this for eight years, you know,
during the construction process when these were being built. (police siren sounds) >> Hello.
>> Hi. >> Can I see your driver's
license, please? >> Sure. What's the problem? >> I think a deputy back here
wants to talk to you. So can you have a seat with me,
please? >> ALTAN: We had attracted the
attention of the farm, who'd called the local sheriff
on us. >> Had a report of some people
hanging around at 250th and 69. You were seen leaving the scene
of the area. >> Yeah.
>> Is that true? >> Yes.
>> Okay. Can you tell me what was going
on? >> No, I used to run these
facilities for DeCoster. >> Oh, you did?
>> Yes. >> Okay.
>> Years ago. >> Okay. What's the guy in the back with
the video camera? >> Oh, they're just some people that were doing a story on
DeCoster now. >> Yeah? Who are they with? Who are they working for? >> ALTAN: Why are you talking
with us? >> Why am I talking with you? Our industry, the egg industry,
is so tight-lipped. You know, I don't know of
anybody that's going to come before you and start talking
about these issues openly without bringing some
repercussions on them or their operations and that. So it's easier for me to do it
because I'm no longer in the industry. It's basically to try to help
the industry as a whole, so they can improve later on and
not run into the same issues that I've been involved in in
the past that have occurred. >> ALTAN: Glessner said one of
the biggest issues was trying to find people to do
the work. >> You know, it's pretty
physical. >> ALTAN: Eight-hour, ten-hour
days? >> No, it could be as much as
16, depending on what was going on. >> ALTAN: Will Americans do this
work? >> Boy, I don't think so. I don't even think... I don't
even know if wage came into it, whether you could keep them. >> ALTAN: To get the work done,
they turned to immigrants, even though he suspected some of
them had false documents. >> It's probably one of these
things that you just don't want
to know. Do you suspect that there...
that this is going on? Probably. But do you really want to try
digging into it? >> ALTAN: In 2001, authorities
raided DeCoster's Iowa plants and detained
approximately 90 undocumented workers. >> The plant was raided several
times throughout several years, and no one looked
into human trafficking. No one looked into exploitation
of workers. >> ALTAN: Sonia Parras
represented some of the workers. They told her they had been
recruited from Mexico, gone into debt, and were being
threatened when they complained. >> It wasn't until we started
unraveling all these multi-layers
of victimization that we realized that some of
these victims were also victims
of human trafficking. >> ALTAN: DeCoster and Glessner
were never charged with labor trafficking, but they were both convicted of
charges related to the hiring
of illegal workers. You pled guilty
to harboring aliens. What does that mean? >> You know what the problem
was? You had people that were working
under one name, okay? You could say they're
undocumented, using forged cards or whatever, and then the next minute they
got legal somehow. But I guess, basically,
they felt I should've known that they were illegal and
allowed them to work still. So I guess you call that
harboring. >> ALTAN: So did...
you pled guilty. Did you know? >> Mmm... >> The recall has grown to more
than 500 million eggs... >> ALTAN: Then in 2010,
a salmonella outbreak sickened an estimated 56,000
people, destroying the company's
reputation. >> At that point, of course,
I'm telling Jack DeCoster that, you know, the operations
need to be sold. Where you are now is, you feel,
cleaned up and adequate? >> Sir, please, let me talk. >> The guy's got so much
baggage, it got to the point you couldn't
even market the eggs. So I go deal with Jack and say, "You know, you've got to sell
the facilities. You've got to lease them. You've got to do something. You've got to get out." >> ALTAN: DeCoster did get out. He stopped running his plants, and instead leased them
to other companies. The Ohio operation was leased
to Trillium Farms, which kept most of DeCoster's
employees. By 2014, it was one of the five
largest in the country, producing ten million eggs a
day. This is where the traffickers
forced the Guatemalan teens to work off their debts. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: This man says he
worked with the teens at Trillium. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: In October 2014,
after four months at Trillium, one of the teens managed to call
his uncle in Florida. The uncle agreed to talk to us, but was afraid to show his face
on camera. >> (speaking Spanish): >> One day I received
a phone call. There was a gentleman that had a
nephew that had been smuggled into the country from Guatemala, and was being kept to work
against his will in Ohio. And within 24 hours,
I had a conference call from the head of the FBI, HSI,
and the U.S. attorney's office in that region. >> ALTAN: Two months later, federal and local law
enforcement moved in. >> A human trafficking bust
at an egg farm in... >> ALTAN: In the early morning
hours, they raided the trailer park
where the teens had been living. >> Federal prosecutors call it
modern-day slavery. >> Their paychecks kept
by their traffickers. >> ALTAN: They detained
approximately 45 people. >> The human trafficking
operation was run by a third-party contractor
hired by Trillium Farms. >> ALTAN: At least ten,
they determined, were victims of trafficking,
including eight minors. >> The U.S. attorney's office
says its investigation is ongoing. >> I mean, how could that
possibly happen? The more we learned about it,
the more it became apparent that there was a connection back
to our immigration policies and how the Department of Health
and Human Services deals with kids who come here
unaccompanied. What makes the Marion case even
more alarming is that a U.S. government agency
was actually responsible for delivering
some of the victims into the hands of the abusers. How could the federal government
take these kids in and try to protect them, and
then as they send them out to families, you know,
pending a court date, give them right back to the
people who had brought them up here? Here's one of those homes--
this is a trailer. >> ALTAN: Senator Rob Portman
was chairman of the committee that investigated the failures at the Department of Health
and Human Services-- the agency that released the
boys to the traffickers in Ohio. >> The more we learned, the more
troubling it was from a federal perspective, because no one seemed to want
to take responsibility for it. >> What everybody's doing is
doing this-- out the door, we're done. >> We've got these kids.
They're here. They're living on our soil. And for us to just, you know,
assume someone else is going to take care of them
and throw them to the wolves, which is what HHS was doing,
is flat-out wrong. I don't care what you think
about immigration policy-- it's wrong. >> ALTAN: The HHS division
responsible for placing the teens declined to be
interviewed. They told the committee they had
strengthened their procedures to protect children. But the committee had found
over a dozen other cases of trafficking related
to the surge, and said it's impossible to know
just how many more victims there are. >> It was not just the Ohio egg
farm case-- there were other cases in which
multiple children were placed with sponsors
in homes where they were subject
to human trafficking, sexual abuse, and other severe
forms of abuse and exploitation. More than 180,000 unaccompanied
minors have been placed in communities
across the country. But because there's so little
follow-up with them once they're out of the
government's care, we have no idea what's happened
to them. >> ALTAN: During our
investigation, we found that some of the
unaccompanied minors ended up in small towns across
the Midwest, like here in Clarion, Iowa. (school bell rings) >> So we were getting, like,
kids, like, every week. They were coming from all over
the place. And most of them, just random
people bring them. And they can say, "They're my
cousin, they're my uncle, And then they say, "Well, he's
not my real uncle, they just tell me to say that." They come to school, but they
don't... they can't function, because they're so tired. And you ask them,
"Why are you so tired?" And they don't respond. And then you keep pushing and
pushing. "Okay, I was working,
I'm working. I have to work. You don't understand--
I have to work." They always say they're in debt. That that's why they're working. >> ALTAN: Berta Alberts works
with immigrant teens, and says many of her students
have told her the only way they pay off their
debt is by working long shifts at nearby food processing
plants. We spoke with some teen workers, but they were afraid to go
on camera. Finally one agreed,
if we concealed his identity. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN (speaking Spanish): >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN (speaking Spanish): >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN (speaking Spanish): >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: To date, we found no
one in law enforcement that has investigated
or intervened here. And people we spoke to said
they'd heard of at least 30 teens working in plants in
this area of Iowa-- paying off debts,
working long hours, unable to leave their jobs. Just like the teens in Ohio. In the months after the raid at
the trailer park, six people were arrested, among them Aroldo Castillo,
the Guatemalan trafficker. He pled guilty to forced labor
and was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison. >> These people charged in this
case, they work as a team. So there's leaders. Then there's what you would call
sort of task masters, the people who actually oversee
the slave labor. And then there's individuals
who recruit and transport them, and they all have different
roles. Some are more culpable than
others. >> ALTAN: After the initial
arrests, prosecutors continued looking
for bigger targets. >> The FBI and the Department of
Homeland Security, they're continuing to
investigate the case. And we will follow the facts
wherever they go. >> ALTAN: We also wanted to
know who else was responsible. Our reporting led us to focus on
a key player in the Ohio operation-- a man who worked with DeCoster,
and then Trillium. His name is Pablo Duran, Sr., and his company had a
multi-million-dollar contract with Trillium to supply workers. >> I can see how some
of these employers are put in the standpoint,
you got no labor or whatever and Pablo Duran shows up and
says, "Hey, I can fix your problem." And it's probably a situation
where they're sitting there saying, you know... "I'm not
going to look too deep into anything." I wasn't out questioning people
and saying, "Hey, are you documented,
you know, non-doc..." you know, I mean,
why go to that standpoint and destroy your own business? >> ALTAN: Pablo Duran, Sr.,
left town after the raid, leaving his family behind. His son, Pablo, Jr., pled guilty
to running a crew that included some of the teens,
but he wouldn't speak to us. We found his younger son, Marco. He told us about the day his
brother was arrested. >> I didn't hear about anything until the week
of Fourth of July. I called my brother. And I'm, like, "What's up, man?" He's, like, "Well, I'm getting
processed." I'm, like, "What the hell do you
mean you're getting processed?" He's, like, "I'm getting put in
jail." I'm, like, "What did you do?" He's, like,
"Dude, I don't even know." I'm, like, "What do you mean?" He's, like, "They said they had
a warrant." And he's, like, "I'm turning
myself in." I was just... I was so...
I was shocked. And then I came home,
and my mom... tears. Showed me the article saying
"human trafficking." And I was thinking... I'm, like,
"When did this happen?" Like, I thought for a second my
brother was living, like, a double life. side he was the good family man that we thought, and then the next, he was doing
very bad things, you know? And then I come to find out he
was doing his job, you know? >> ALTAN: Pablo Duran, Jr.,
ended up spending 14 months in prison, but Marco says his
brother was just following orders from their father. >> My dad was the main boss, so
my dad pretty much owned all crews, but that was the crew
that my dad gave to my brother. >> ALTAN: Marco says he also
worked with his father at Trillium when he was in high
school, and when the Guatemalan teens
were there. >> I remember when I was working
there, my dad stopped by, because he was one of the,
you know, lead guys. And he stopped by and he pulled
me aside, he's, like, "You need to look around." He's, like,
"These young people," you know, "younger than you,"
he's, like, "these people come
from poor countries and they're working harder
than most people that were born here with
the citizenship, and, you know, all those rights." My dad told me their ages and how they ranged from 13
to about 18. So they were high schoolers in
the U.S., you know, high schoolers,
barely middle schoolers, kids like me, working like that. You don't see my dad going to
jail or going to prison and being taken away
from his family. My dad was smart about
everything, and was able to make it that he
wouldn't get taken away. He's in Mexico right now. >> ALTAN: In fact, we found out
there was a warrant for his arrest, and an order
to extradite him. And we found court records that
alleged he had been in regular contact
with Aroldo Castillo about smuggling in minors
to work at Trillium. We kept looking for Duran
and people that knew him. One of his crew leaders agreed
to talk from prison. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Bartolo Dominguez says
he knew some of the teens, but didn't know they were being
abused or having their wages taken. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Dominguez says that
Duran ran his company with his brother, Ezequiel. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Ezequiel Duran was
never charged in the case. We went looking for him, and
were surprised to find him living with his family
in a quiet Ohio suburb. (doorbell rings) Hi, I was wondering if
Ezequiel's here. >> No, he's not. >> ALTAN: He's not, okay. I gave them my number and left. It felt like a dead end. But a few minutes later,
as I was driving away, the phone rang. It was Ezequiel. >> ALTAN (speaking Spanish): >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN (speaking Spanish): >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: A month after this
call, Ezequiel Duran was found dead
in his home with a gunshot wound
to the head. His death was ruled a suicide. After months of looking for him
while he was wanted by the FBI, we tracked down Pablo Duran. He agreed to meet us
in Mexico City. Is Pablo someone you would ever
consider dangerous? >> I wouldn't. I think he's like a rat
in a corner, though. I think he'd do anything to get
out of that corner if you trapped him in it. He's so stubborn, he believes
exactly what he's doing. And he's going to come across
like he didn't do anything wrong, if you could get it out
of him and stuff. And, "It wasn't me." I mean, he'll have the biggest story like you can't... and he'll... If you didn't know better,
you'd almost believe him. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: One of your
sub-contractors was your own son,
Pablo Duran, Jr. And your son, he did have minors
on his crew, right? That's what he pled guilty to. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: You never talked to
him about it, or... >> No.>> ALTAN: The federal judn
the case said that your son Pablo, Jr., took the fall for
you, for what you knew. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Well, I think it was
because there were so many minors working on different
crews that... How could you miss them? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: As a sup... as
somebody in charge... >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: So you never had any
interaction with, knowledge of any minors
that were there? >> No. >> ALTAN: So are all these
people, are they lying? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Did you know a man
named Aroldo Castillo? >> No. >> ALTAN: And so you never had
any conversations? You never met Aroldo? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: I'm going to read you
what the government says about your relationship. >> ALTAN: They say, "Castillo
Serrano talked regularly on the phone with
Pablo Duran, Sr. Those discussions included the
fact that minors were having an easier time
getting across the border and that they should therefore
focus their activities on teenagers." What do you say to that? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: So you say you did not
have any relationship? You don't even know who he is? >> No. >> ALTAN: And you never spoke on
the phone with him? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: So you do have a
memory, then, of speaking with him
at one point on the phone? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Did Trillium know that
there were minors working there, do you think? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: How does it work? Do the Trillium managers check
the plants, or would they be able to see? Tell me a little bit. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: So the relationship
is a Trillium supervisor and a subcontractor would be
seeing each other every day? >> Yes. >> ALTAN: And they would be
seeing the workers? >> Yep. >> ALTAN: So in your opinion,
would Trillium have been able to see that there were minors
working there? >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Trillium ended its
contract with Pablo Duran shortly after the raid,
and has not been charged with any wrongdoing. For more than a year, they
refused our interview requests. But, finally, the company's
vice president agreed. When you heard the words
"human trafficking," had you encountered this
in the business before? >> No, I had not. I was stunned. My first reaction was, I
couldn't believe that anything like this would be happening on
our farms or in our environment. Looking back on it, I was naive. I did not understand what I
understand today of how prevalent it is around
the country. And I am responsible for
the day-to-day operations, and it happened here
on my watch. And so I do have a duty to do
everything we can do to ensure this doesn't happen again and to
spread the word so that others are aware of
this. This occurred, it did occur
under my watch, but we did not know this
and we did not see it. >> ALTAN: How do you not see
teenagers, the ages of your own kids, how
do you how do you miss that? >> We don't supervise those
contract service providers. So our managers, our
supervisors, they're checking that the work
is complete, they're checking that the work
gets done adequately, but they're not actually telling
this person to go here or that person to go do this. So we're not directly
supervising the people doing that work. >> ALTAN: But there was someone
inside who might have known what was going on:
Ezequiel Duran. Although he was fired in 2014,
for several years he was actually a Trillium
manager at the same time that the
company he ran with his brother was bringing in workers. Were you aware that he was both
an employee and a contractor? >> I don't believe I knew that,
no. >> ALTAN: Because if he was,
then as a manager who was also running the
contracting companies, he's somebody who would have
known potentially that there were kids being
brought in. >> I don't know. My... my understanding... I
believe that I don't remember the date that Ezequiel left
employment with the company. As we came to understand that
people weren't comporting with our values and what our
expectations were, we made changes-- we asked them
to leave the company and we made improvements,
changes. >> ALTAN: I mean that
wouthe contractor seems like ano a joint employment issue. So, you know, that's one thing
that's been confounding to us, is that Ezequiel was both a
manager who was overseeing plants, and also was running
this contracting company, Haba, run by... with his brother. >> We were obviously lied to. We were obviously misled at
numerous points in this process. And as I said, we've done a lot
of learning as this process has commenced. Was everything correct?
No. Are we learning?
Are we making changes? Are we making improvements?
Yes. Did we act swiftly
when law enforcement alerted us to this problem?
Yes. Have we complied and cooperated
with the investigation? Yes. >> ALTAN: Should Trillium have
been held responsible in any way for what happened on
their property? >> I'm confident that
if the federal officials would have believed that and
would have found wrongdoing on our part, we would have been
held accountable. In that way-- criminally. >> ALTAN: Trillium has partnered
with a leading anti-trafficking organization
to implement reforms and train their employees. The company would not allow us
to film inside their plants, but they sent us this video to
show what working there is like. They say they're trying to
reduce using contractors to find workers, but haven't
eliminated them completely. And they're currently hiring. Back in Guatemala, the teens'
families would eventually get their deeds back, as a result of Aroldo Castillo's
sentencing. His mother had been holding
on to them. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: These were mostly
neighbors and relatives. We asked if any of them
still owe money. >> (speaking Spanish): >> ALBERTO (speaking Spanish): >> ALTAN: Alberto still tends
the fields he worked with his oldest son, but he hasn't
seen him in almost four years. Alberto's son and some of the
other teens from Guatemala were given special visas
for victims of trafficking. Some are in school,
others are working. But even today, the ones we've
found are still too afraid to go on camera. Two months after we'd
interviewed him in Mexico, Pablo Duran attempted to return
to the U.S. He was arrested at the border
and is now in Ohio facing labor trafficking
charges. The U.S. attorney says the
investigation is ongoing. >> Until our laws
and our systems and our society held responsible
everyone that profits from human
trafficking, we're not ending
human trafficking. And we don't know how many other
cases are out there, and the crime continues. >> For more on this
and other programs, visit our website
at pbs.org/frontline. ♪ ♪ "Frontline's" "Trafficked in
America" is available on DVD. To order, visit shopPBS.org
or call 1-800-PLAY-PBS. "Frontline" is also available
for download on iTunes. ♪ ♪
