Brothers charged with bringing undocumented immigrants to work for construction trade by force

CHICAGO (CBS) — Two brothers from Chicago stand charged with labor trafficking on the grounds that they forced undocumented Mexican immigrants to work in the construction trade.

Agustin Arias Lopez, 30, and Juan Arias Lopez, 32, were charged by federal prosecutors with conspiring to bring two people from Mexico illegally to the U.S. to work in their construction business, and demanding that they repay the purported cost of their transport to the U.S.

After the immigrants arrived in Chicago, they worked 12 to 15 hours a day, seven days a week, in exchange for weekly payments from the Arias Lopez brothers of $800 to $1,000, prosecutors said.

The immigrant laborers were ordered to return $500 per week of that sum, which the brothers said was to repay the costs of their transport the U.S. and for rent, prosecutors said. The immigrants lived Agustin Arias Lopez’s unfinished basement in Englewood, prosecutors said.

Read the full complaint

The brothers threatened the immigrants with violence if they did not pay the money, and on one occasion last November, Agustin Arias Lopez threatened one of them at gunpoint, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors released a photo of a rifle seized from Agustin Arias Lopez’s home.

The Arias Lopez brothers are charged with conspiracy to knowingly bring, transport, harbor, and induce aliens to come to, enter, remain in, and reside in the U.S.  They were arrested Thursday and are due for a detention hearing on Monday.