Five former employees unlikely to receive money because vegetable packing plant closed and the three men, two of them owner’s sons, were never arrested

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

A federal jury awarded almost US$17.5m to five former female employees of a South Florida farm who said they were either raped or sexually harassed at a vegetable packing plant, their lawyer and the US equal employment opportunity commission said on Thursday.



Three men, including two sons of the owner of Moreno Farms, near Fort Myers in south-west Florida, were accused of sexual harassment against the women in 2011 and 2012 in coolers and an office trailer at the packing house. They were also accused of rape, groping, kissing and threats they would be fired if they refused to have sex with supervisors, according to the legal complaint brought against Moreno Farms.

However, the women are unlikely to receive a penny because the packing house closed after the case was brought and the men were never arrested, a lawyer for the women, Victoria Mesa-Estrada, said.



“It’s more of a symbolic victory,” she said. “The women knew that when the case was brought. But for them it was a question of justice.”

Four of the women attended the two-day trial in Miami. “They were in tears when the verdict was read,” said Mesa-Estrada.

The accused men did not appear in court and nor was the company represented by an attorney during the trial. Reuters was unable to reach any of the accused men or Moreno Farms or their lawyers.

The women, three from Mexico and two from Central America, were fired for resisting the three men, identified as Oscar and Omar Moreno, and the packing line supervisor, Javier Garcia.

Three of the women claimed they were raped and two escaped attempted rape. One woman was raped three times and one was raped by both brothers at the same time.

The women will be granted special U visas for victims of crime who assist law enforcement in prosecuting cases, said Mesa-Estrada.

The women originally went to the police in Hendry county a few weeks after the abuse but prosecutors decided there was insufficient evidence to build a case against the men.

“There was no real effort to investigate,” Mesa-Estrada said.