The day a month began for a man for a man accused of “significant” trafficking, the case of the crown crumbled for a technicalism.
Christian Vinela, 37, and his defense lawyer had not received all the dissemination or evidence related to the case in the years prior to the criminal trial, said April 23, the assistant lawyer of the Crown, Heather Palin.
“There was a significant dissemination problem, which crystallized at the end of last week, which had potential implications to derail the [trial]”Palin told the judge of the Ontario Court Stephen Darroch.
Vitela had not accessed all the telephone records of migrant workers who was accused of traffic: the phones had been seized by the RCMP and “typically the central dissemination in the prosecutions of trafficking in persons,” said Vitela’s lawyer, Tobias Okada-Phillips.
The RCMP, which initially established nine positions of trafficking against Vitela in 2019, has a different version of the events. It includes that they notified Vitela on several occasions that the information was available, and established a room and a computer to see the materials, but he never appeared.
The RCMP told CBC Hamilton in an email in June that they do not comment on the decisions taken by the prosecutors, but “the central dissemination that was required to prove the charges … The defense was provided long before the scheduled trial dates.”
In the end, the crown considered that the issue substantial enough to cancel the trial, with the approval of the judge and after reaching a guilt with Vitela. The Attorney General of Ontario declined to comment.
The Joint RCMP investigation and the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) that began in 2018 involved multiple agencies, including federal immigration officials, and Ontario, Hamilton, Peel, Niagara and the Waterloo Police, with the police saying that they worked together to “combat the crime and guarantee the security of all our citizens.”
In May, CBSA said the arrests and the sentence reflected an “unwavering commitment to preserve the integrity of the Canada immigration system.”
People trafficking is one of the fastest growing crimes worldwide, he says The Ontario governmentwhich has a strategy and financing for police investigations and a special crown team to “hold criminals through vigorous prosecutions.”
80 people who are living in ‘Substandard Conditions’
In 2019, RCMP accused Vitela for the most serious crime of trafficking in people along with five other people for similar positions.
Police said in a press release that they had found about 80 people from Mexico “that are reduced under conditions of less than the standard” in multiple properties, including a dozen at the Vitela’s Milton home, Ontario.
But this spring, Vitela admitted the slightest charge of using foreign citizens without authorization and was sentenced to two years of probation. He was also granted a conditional, which means that he will not have a criminal record if he meets the probation requirements.
Vitela gave migrant workers, who did not have work permits, works through their employment agency, Palin said, reading a joint presentation agreed by the defense.
Vitela would organize its transport to and from the work sites through the golden horseshoe, including the recycling and packing plants of meat, greenhouses and farms of flowers, fruits and minks, Palin said. The working conditions were sometimes exhausting.
Vitela collected payments from these companies and paid the workers, less rent and other expenses. Two workers received less money from what they expected, Palin said.
The RCMP told CBC Hamilton in an email last month that “the control conditions were in place in the Vitela residence.”
“The victims reported that they were forced to give up their travel documents and were not allowed outdoors when they were at the residence,” the researchers said.
People trafficking is a “modern form of slavery,” says the public security of Canada website. It implies recruitment, transport, port and exercise of control over people through forced labor.
The maximum sentence for someone declared guilty of human trafficking is life imprisonment.
At the audience in April, Vitela apologized “for not evaluating and examining” two people who worked for him “more than six years ago for a couple of weeks.”
The judge recognized the “significant impact” that the positions have had in Vitela’s life, even in his business and his ability to travel.
“Having charges hanging on someone’s head for so long can have a significant deterrent effect on someone,” Darroch said. “I hope that is the case for you.”
RCMP charges against Vitela’s mother were also removed.
Case connected to other trafficking crimes in Hamilton
Vitela was connected with two people in Hamilton who were also accused of human trafficking in RCMP investigation: Miurel Bracamonte and Mario Roca Morales, Palin said.
Bracamonte, 47, picked up and transported workers to work sites, organized by Vitela and Roca Morales, and directed his own employment agency, said Crown Lawyer Jim Cruess at an audience in February 2023.
“I gave them a job, I am guilty of that,” Bracamonte told the court.
He declared himself guilty of using foreign citizens without authorization, and was sentenced to four months of house arrest and eight months of probation.
“The accusations against Miurel were that she was a secondary player in the group,” Cruess said in 2023. “The most serious of them is against Mr. Roca [Morales] and Mr. Vinela “.
Roca Morales, 52, declared himself guilty of three positions of trafficking in persons in February 2024 and was sentenced to 8½ years in prison.
The facts of his case were presented in a joint presentation presented to the Court and seen by CBC Hamilton.
The six people in Mexico entered Canada through the airports of Montreal and Toronto in 2018 and 2019, and worked for Roca Morales while living in miserable conditions in Hamilton. He determined his salary, how much they had allegedly and delayed the payments.
It would be verbally governed and threatened to harm them physically, take away their work or homes, or arrested them, while dressed in camouflage and sometimes carried a weapon, said the joint submission. He sexually aggressed one of the women and told others that he wanted to impregnate them, he said.
Another woman who lived in her department said she was “afraid of all the time … since he was always drinking and violent to his wife,” said the judicial document. Roca Morales restricted when they could bathe, when they could leave and what they could eat.
More than 12 people would live in one of their houses at the same time, who were infested with bedbugs, cockroaches and mice.
A man “opened the fridge and saw cockroaches out of the internship,” said the joint submission.
At his sentence hearing, Roca Morales called some of the “criminals” victims and told the judge to “see.”
A permanent resident of Canada, Roca Morales will probably be deported to his biological country in Guatemala after complying with his sentence, according to the court.
