A federal grand jury in Illinois has handed down a nine-count indictment that reveals the terrible consequences of a “family loophole” in federal immigration law in a horrific story that alleges kidnapping, abuse, modern slavery, pedophilia and rape.
Domingo Francisco-Juan, Lorenza Domingo-Castaneda and Catarina Domingo-Juan, three Guatemalan nationals and siblings, are now charged with conspiracy to commit forced labor, forced labor, conspiracy to commit kidnapping and kidnapping, according to the Department of Justice.
The family’s victims were a pair of little girls. The youngest was just 10 when she was smuggled to the United States as an unaccompanied minor. Federal authorities, “overwhelmed,” as Stephen Dinan of The Washington Times wrote, by the volume of illegal immigrants, accepted the claims of the family — illegal immigrants themselves — that they were related to the two young Guatemalan girls.
Officials approved the Domingo-Juan family as sponsors, evidently with little or no meaningful follow-up.
“According to the allegations set forth in the indictment, between December 2015 and March 2021 the defendants conspired to bring two minor victims from Guatemala to the United States to work in Domingo-Castaneda’s and Domingo-Juan’s homes,” the DOJ press release said. “The defendants compelled the victims to provide childcare, cooking, and cleaning within the homes and to work outside the homes in local hotels, factories, and a restaurant.”
“[T]he defendants used false promises of a better life and an education to gain the permission of the victims’ mothers for their minor daughters to be brought to the United States to live with the defendants,” the release continued. “Defendants Domingo-Castaneda and Domingo-Juan also allegedly forced a third victim to work in their homes and outside their homes at local businesses.”
The DOJ said the defendants “isolated the victims in their homes, restricted their communications with their family in Guatemala, and subjected them to physical, verbal and psychological abuse, among other coercive means.”
The Washington Times described the “nightmare” the girls were forced to endure at the hands of their captors. Federal prosecutors have brought allegations, according to The Times, stating one girl brought to the U.S. as a 10-year-old was “raped repeatedly, stabbed with a kitchen knife and subjected to regular beatings.”
The Times reported that one witness cooperating with the investigation told authorities she saw one of the girls beaten on “at least 20 occasions.”
Did federal officials understand the consequences beforehand?
In one instance, the witness observed a wound resembling a “tear” near the girl’s mouth. The girl said Catarina Domingo-Juan “came at her with a knife because the girl failed to cook a meal properly, ” according to court documents, as reported by The Times.
Investigators said one of the girls, identified as “Victim 1” was raped by four different members of the Domingo-Juan family, including Catarina Domingo-Juan’s two sons, eventually becoming pregnant. The young girl escaped to a Missouri hospital, where doctors there determined she had miscarried. She had never even known she was pregnant, according to The Times.
While the Department of Health and Human Services has claimed sponsors are “vetted” prior to the process that pairs them together with sponsoring families, federal prosecutors have alleged Francisco-Juan has had six previous deportations and an “extensive criminal history, and coached the girls to tell authorities they were coming to live with their aunt in Illinois,” ADN America reported.
This “aunt” was Catarina Domingo-Juan, who was in no way related to the girls.
According to The Washington Times, “[r]ecords from the federal Health and Human Services Department, which takes charge of most illegal immigrant children, claim that a worker verified the relationship, checked fingerprints and scrutinized proof of income and address.”
A January 2016 Senate Subcommittee report cited by The Center for Immigration Studies also revealed “systemic deficiencies” in the sponsor verification process, including HHS’s failure to “adequately vet sponsors to ensure that they are willing and able to provide proper care and support to any child — much less children as vulnerable as UACs.”
Many of these issues have been exacerbated under President Joe Biden’s leadership, critics have charged.
Jessica Vaughan, the policy studies director at the CIS, told The Times, “This case is truly sickening. But it’s also terribly frustrating because the federal government is fully aware of the potential for such awful things to be done to young kids under the current system, but refuses to put in place policies to prevent it.”
Vaughn explained how the Biden administration has rolled back Trump-era requirements for DNA testing of suspect families at the border, according to The Times. She also said they no longer conduct worksite enforcement to check for illegal immigrant children who are working as adults.
She pointed to the Illinois case as a contrast between the immigration policies under Former President Trump and what Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and Democrat leaders have couched as a more humane stance.
She added, “In fact, (Mayorkas) is an accomplice to this kind of trafficking and abuse because he has implemented the policies that enable it. It shouldn’t take a rape and miscarriage to discover this abuse.”
