A Queens woman is accused of holding two immigrant adolescents against their will and ordering them to work for hours on end, turn over wages and sleep on a bare floor, the Queens District Attorney said.
Sook Yeong Park, 42, of Flushing, was charged with labor trafficking, assault, and endangering the welfare of a child offenses at her arraignment Saturday, authorities said.
If convicted, she faces up to seven years in prison.
“According to the charges, the defendant cut off all contact between the two young victims and their parents in Korea, held them hostage in her home by seizing their passports, forced them to do household chores well into the night and to work outside of the home and turn over all their earnings to her. In return, the victims were allegedly given space to sleep on the floor without a mattress. In the older child’s case, the space allegedly was in a closet,” Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said in a statement.
The children were turned over to Park by a relative in 2010, when they were 9 and 11, authorities said.
She then allegedly forced the older child, a girl, to do household chores for 10 hours straight daily; stole the girl’s wages after she got a job at a local supermarket; and cut her on the back of the legs with a nail clipper.
Park allegedly did not let either child have contact with their relatives in Korea, and forced them both to sleep on the floor without a mattress, authorities said.
Park was held on $2,500 cash bail at her arraignment. She is due back in court Fe. 16. Her attorney, Dennis Ring, says Park didn't commit any crime.