New Orleans - A New Orleans jury on Wednesday awarded $14m to five Indian men who were lured to the United States and forced to work under inhumane conditions after Hurricane Katrina by a US ship repair firm and its co-defendants.
After a four-week trial, the US District Court jury ruled that Alabama-based Signal International was guilty of labour trafficking, fraud, racketeering and discrimination and ordered it to pay $12m. Its co-defendants, a New Orleans lawyer and an India-based recruiter, were also found guilty and ordered to pay an additional $915 000 each.
The trial was the first in more than a dozen related lawsuits with over 200 plaintiffs that together comprise one of the largest labour trafficking cases in US history.