Doctors accused of keeping slave for 20 years
Two US doctors have been arrested and accused of keeping an illegal Filipino immigrant in their luxury home for 20 years, not paying her or allowing her to leave without an escort except for shopping trips.
Doctors Jefferson and Elnora Calimlim, of Milwaukee, were freed without bail after being charged.
“To hold a domestic servant in virtual servitude for 20 years is a shocking callous disregard for our nation’s most deeply held values,” said Immigration and Customs agent Brian Falvey.
Investigators are trying to determine if the Calimlims sent money to the maid’s family in the Philippines as promised.
The couple agreed to pay the woman 100 dollars month from 1985 to 1995 and 400 dollars a month thereafter, but the woman said she has never seen the money.
The maid, Erma Martinez, told investigators the Calimlims did not allow her to date, go to the cinema or socialise with anyone outside the family unless the couple determined that person was trustworthy.
When Martinez requested help to return to the Philippines to visit her ill father, the couple told her they would help her obtain a visa “but have failed to do so for 20 years,” an affidavit said.
The couple’s lawyer, Tom Brown, said Martinez was not held against her will and that her wages were sent to her family in the Philippines.
“It would be a significant stretch to say that this lady could not have walked away any time she wanted to and that there weren’t innumerable times that she was totally on her own and couldn’t have walked away or said something,” he said.
