Ninth Circuit sides with Cambodian seafood workers in human trafficking case
Courthouse News reports that an en banc panel of the Ninth Circuit in an opinion by Judge Susan Graber yesterday reversed a lower court decision declining to reconsider a case under an updated anti-trafficking law in a case brought by several Cambodian villagers forced to work in the Thai seafood industry.
The court reversed a district court ruling that denied villagers’ requests for summary judgment and found no evidence that seafood distributor knowingly participated in or benefited from human trafficking.
The plaintiffs were seven Cambodian villagers forced to work in Thailand’s seafood industry. The claim in the lawsuit was that several U.S. and Thai companies subjected them to forced labor in violation of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA).
