"Florida Couple Pleads Guilty To Abusing Filipino Workers"? Why Not "Hispanic Couple Abusing Florida Workers"?
09/18/2010
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One thing about these "Not Reporting Race" stories is that the victims frequently are identified by ethnicity and immigration status—"Pity the poor immigrant"—but the offenders never do.

When I saw the headline that said "Florida Couple" I just knew it wouldn't mean a white couple, with the husband looking like Boss Hogg and the wife looking like Minnie Pearl, it would be a Latin American couple.

Florida couple pleads guilty to abusing Filipino workers AFP Fri Sep 17, 5:59 pm ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) A Florida couple pleaded guilty to conspiring to hold 39 Filipino employees against their will working in country clubs and hotels, the US Justice Department said Friday.

Sophia Manuel, 41, and Alfonso Baldonado Jr., 45, were owners of a labor contracting service based in the Florida city of Boca Raton.[More]

Believe it or not, some of the victims had legal guestworker visas:"Manuel also pleaded guilty to lying in an application filed with the US Labor Department to obtain foreign labor certifications and visas under the federal H2B guest worker program."

I don't know, because it doesn't say in the story, whether Manuel and Baldonado are Cuban-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Guatemalans, or what. It's very confused in Florida—Miami is sometimes referred to as "The Capital Of The Americas." The only Hispanic in this story is whose citizenship status  I'm certain of  is Thomas E. Perez,Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division, who made the announcement. He's a Dominican American, who was born in Buffalo.

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