Two Portuguese women were sentenced by the Court of Faro for crimes of aiding illegal immigration and recruiting illegal labor.
The two defendants, aged 57 and 39, were sentenced to prison terms of three years and nine months and two years and two months, suspended for the same period.
The crimes in question took place in “July 2016, when the two women recruited several citizens of Hindustani origin in the Martim Moniz area of Lisbon with the aim of working for the agricultural company they represented in Famalicão, promising to help in their legalization, since they were all in an irregular situation in national territory», according to the Foreigners and Borders Service (SEF), whose investigation supported the judicial process.
«In the following September, one of the defendants transported the citizens to the Algarve, where they were housed in containers on a farm», adds the same security force.
The court found that “citizens were exploited at work, working between 8 and 12 hours a day and seven days a week, not being monetarily compensated for the effect”.
Neither was 'the agreed amount or food allowance paid. It was also proved that the defendants took advantage of the fragility in which these foreign citizens found themselves».
“The collective of judges understood that the defendants knew that by hiring, transporting, housing and benefiting from the work of these foreign citizens, they favored and facilitated the illegal stay of foreigners in national territory”, concluded the SEF.
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