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SAUDI NATIONAL CONVICTED OF VISA FRAUD AND HARBORING ILLEGAL ALIENS

BOSTON - A Saudi national living in Winchester, Mass. pleaded guilty today in federal court to charges of visa fraud and harboring of illegal aliens relating to her employment of two domestic servants.

Hana F. Al Jader, 40, of Winchester, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Reginald J. Lindsay to two counts of visa fraud and two counts of harboring illegal aliens for private financial gain in connection with her employment of two women from Indonesia as domestic servants,

At today's plea hearing, the prosecutor told the Court that Al Jader, who has resided in Winchester and Arlington since the mid-1990's with her invalid husband, Prince Mohamed Al Saud, brought the two Indonesian women to the United States in 2003 to work as domestic servants. In order to obtain visas for the women, Al Jader was required to submit to the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia a copy of a work contract guaranteeing that the women would be paid $1,500 a month and would work no more than eight hours daily. However, when the women arrived in the United States, they were required to work - cooking, cleaning, serving meals, caring for the severely disabled Prince, and serving at frequent parties - routinely in excess of eight hours per day. Al Jader paid them only $300 a month which, at their request, was wired to their families in Indonesia.

In July 2003, Al Jader, through an attorney, filed applications with the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services for a six-month extension of the visas for her domestic servants. In connection with the extension application, Al Jader submitted another employment contract, which again represented falsely that the servants were each being paid $1,500 per month and working only eight hours per day. Based on the false information provided in the contracts, the servants' visas were extended, however, when those extensions expired, Al Jader failed to apply for or obtain any additional extensions. Despite the fact that the servants' legal status had expired, Al Jader continued to employ them for the next 11 months at the same pay rate of $300 per month.

In exchange for Al Jader's plea of guilty to these charges, her agreement to pay restitution of approximately $98,000 to each of the servants, and her acceptance of a stipulated order of deportation to her native Saudi Arabia, the government agreed to dismiss pending charges of forced labor and document servitude against Al Jader.

Judge Lindsay scheduled sentencing for Dec. 12, 2006, at 2:30 p.m. Al Jader faces a maximum punishment of 10 years in prison, to be followed by three years supervised release, and a fine of $250,000 on each of the four counts.

Balilife, $17 per hour flat for a 50 hour week is exploitation. Their workmates are on around the same money - for the first 38 hours - and then they are on overtime rates.
These guys have to work a 50 hour week- which means 5 days of 9 or 9.5 hours one week, and 6 x 9 hour days the following week. You try doing physical labour for those sorts of hours - it sucks. They are locked into this for 4 years and have no option to leave and work for another employer.

$13.91 is in my opinion far far too high as a minimum wage.. it tells our youth they don't need to strive, but rather just meet low standards..