This is frightening that something SO HORRIBLE and SO OUTRAGEOUS would happen in OUR community! Human trafficking? What is wrong with people? Good job Lower Merion PD for uncovering this! It is such a sad commentary on the world in which we live that this could happen here....and it's funny, because if you live in Ardmore, or hang out there, you will notice an increased immigrant presence....and like many other towns, these folks take the jobs we all take for granted...and who knew such crime and tragedy existed in a place we hold so dear?

2 Charged With Human Trafficking in Ardmore Area
by KYW's Tony Hanson

Federal authorities in Philadelphia have indicted two men, both illegal aliens, on charges that they smuggled six other people including children into the Montgomery County area for cash, and then enslaved some of those who could not pay.

The alleged scheme came to light when one of the smuggled women was beaten and went to police despite threats against her and her family.

US attorney Patrick Meehan says the defendants -- one from Mexico, the other Honduras -- demanded a fee of $2,500 to $7,000 each to smuggle the six across the Mexican border and into the Ardmore area.

Meehan says some of the illegal immigrants paid in full, but three others were forced into servitude....Meehan says a 33-year-old woman, a Honduran national trying to raise money for four children at home, was ordered into prostitution. She refused, and after a beating she went to police in Lower Merion. That's when the smuggling ring was uncovered and the two men were taken into custody.

For more on this subject of human trafficking visit
Not For Sale Campaign

Related: 2 illegal immigrants in Montco accused of sneaking people into U.S.
By Joseph A. Slobodzian
Inquirer Staff Writer

Two illegal immigrants living in Montgomery County were accused by a federal grand jury yesterday of smuggling six people from Latin America to their Ardmore apartment for fees of up to $7,500.
The indictment also alleges that Elvis Nuricumbo-Pena, 31, a Mexican national, and Marubeny Martinez-Oliveth, 32, a native of Honduras, coerced repayment of their fees by threatening the lives of their clients and their families and, in one case, by punching a female client and trying to force her into prostitution.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Suzanne B. Ercole said both were in federal custody pending a formal detention hearing Friday before a federal magistrate judge.

.....The clients were housed with the two alleged smugglers, to control repayment of the smuggling fee, or in another Ardmore apartment. They were also charged room and board.....On Jan. 25, the indictment alleges, the two smugglers pinned Y.E.V.'s arms, punched and scratched her in the face, and threatened to kill her and her family.

The smugglers also allegedly threatened to force her to work off the fee as a prostitute and to have her daughter in Honduras sold into prostitution.

Meehan said the physical assault appeared to be the smugglers' undoing: Y.E.V. required medical care, Lower Merion Township police were contacted, and police suspected that it was "more than just a domestic incident."