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On the day a month-long trial for a man accused of “significant” human trafficking was set to begin, the Crown’s case fell apart over a technicality.
Christian Vitela, 37, and his defence lawyer had not received all disclosure or evidence related to the case in the years leading up to the criminal trial, assistant Crown attorney Heather Palin said on April 23.
“There was a significant disclosure issue, which crystallized late last week, which had potential implications to derail the [trial],” Palin told Ontario Court Justice Stephen Darroch.
Vitela hadn’t accessed all phone records of the migrant workers he was charged with trafficking — the phones had been seized by the RCMP and were “typically core disclosure in human trafficking prosecutions,” said Vitela’s lawyer, Tobias Okada-Phillips.
The RCMP, which initially laid nine human trafficking charges against Vitela in 2019, have a different version of events. It includes that they notified Vitela on several occasions that the information was available, and set up a room and computer for him to view the materials, but he never showed up.
The RCMP told CBC Hamilton in an email in June that they don’t comment on decisions made by prosecutors, but “the core disclosure that was required to prove the charges … was provided to the defence well in advance of the scheduled trial dates.”
In the end, the Crown found the issue substantial enough to cancel the trial, with the judge’s approval, and after reaching a plea agreement with Vitela. The Attorney General of Ontario declined to comment further.
The joint RCMP and Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) investigation that began in 2018 involved multiple agencies — including federal immigration officials, and Ontario, Hamilton, Peel, Niagara and Waterloo police — with law enforcement saying they worked together to “combat crime and ensure the safety of all our citizens.”
In May, CBSA said the arrests and sentencing reflected an “unwavering commitment to preserving the integrity of Canada’s immigration system.”
Human trafficking is one of the fastest-growing crimes worldwide, says the Ontario government, which has a strategy and funding in place for police investigations and a special Crown team to “hold offenders accountable through vigorous prosecutions.”
80 people found living in ‘sub-standard conditions’
In 2019, RCMP charged Vitela for the more serious crime of human trafficking along with five other people on similar charges.
Police said in a news release that they’d found about 80 people from Mexico “subsiding in sub-standard conditions” across multiple properties, including a dozen in Vitela’s Milton, Ont., home.
But this spring, Vitela admitted to the lesser charge of employing foreign nationals without authorization and was sentenced to two years of probation. He was also granted a conditional discharge, meaning he won’t have a criminal record if he fulfils the probation requirements.
Vitela gave the migrant workers, who didn’t have work permits, jobs through his employment agency, Palin said, reading from a joint submission agreed to by the defence.
Vitela would arrange their transportation to and from job sites across the Golden Horseshoe, including recycling and meat packing plants, greenhouses, and flower, fruit and mink farms, said Palin. Work conditions were, at times, gruelling.
Vitela collected payments from those businesses and paid the workers, minus rent and other expenses. Two workers received less money from Vitela than they’d expected, said Palin.
The RCMP told CBC Hamilton in an email last month that “conditions of control were in place at the Vitela residence.”
“The victims reported that they were forced to give up their travel documents and were not allowed outdoors when they were at the residence,” investigators said.
Human trafficking is a “modern-day form of slavery,” says Public Safety Canada’s website. It involves recruitment, transportation, harbouring and exercising control over people through forced labour.
The maximum sentence for someone found guilty of human trafficking is life imprisonment.
At the hearing in April, Vitela apologized “for not screening and vetting” two people who worked for him “over six years ago for a couple of weeks.”
The judge recognized the “significant impact” the charges have had on Vitela’s life, including on his business and ability to travel.
“Having charges hanging over someone’s head for so long can have a significant deterrent effect on someone,” said Darroch. “I hope that’s the case for you.”
The RCMP charges against Vitela’s mother were also withdrawn.
Case connected to other trafficking crimes in Hamilton
Vitela was connected to two people in Hamilton who were also charged with human trafficking in the RCMP investigation: Miurel Bracamonte and Mario Roca Morales, said Palin.
Bracamonte, 47, picked up and transported workers to job sites, arranged by Vitela and Roca Morales, and went on to run her own employment agency, said assistant Crown attorney Jim Cruess at a hearing in February 2023.
“I did give them a job — I am guilty of that,” Bracamonte told the court.
She pleaded guilty to employing foreign nationals without authorization, and was sentenced to four months of house arrest and eight months probation.
“The allegations against Miurel was that she was a secondary player in the group,” said Cruess in 2023. “The most serious of them are against Mr. Roca [Morales] and Mr. Vitela.”
Roca Morales, 52, pleaded guilty to three counts of human trafficking in February 2024 and was sentenced to 8½ years in prison.
The facts of his case were laid out in a joint submission filed with the court and seen by CBC Hamilton.
The six people from Mexico entered Canada through Montreal and Toronto airports in 2018 and 2019, and worked for Roca Morales while living in squalid conditions in Hamilton. He determined their pay, how much they supposedly owed him and delayed payments.
He would verbally berate and threaten to physically harm them, take away their jobs or housing, or have them arrested, while dressing in camouflage and at times carrying a gun, said the joint submission. He sexually assaulted one of the women and told others he wanted to impregnate them, it said.
Another woman who lived in his apartment said she was “fearful the whole time … as he was always drinking and violent toward his wife,” the court document said. Roca Morales restricted when they could bathe, when they could go outside and what they could eat.
Upwards of 12 people would live in one of his houses at a time, which were infested with bedbugs, cockroaches and mice.
One man “opened the fridge and saw cockroaches pour out of the crisper,” said the joint submission.
At his sentencing hearing, Roca Morales called some of the victims “criminals” and told the judge to “f–k off.”
A permanent resident of Canada, Roca Morales will likely be deported to his birth country of Guatemala after serving his sentence, the court heard.