MIAMI — If you bought melons sold at Kroger, Schnucks, Walmart, its big box club offspring, Sam’s Club or other chains, they might’ve been harvested or packed by H-2A visa workers provided by Los Villatoros Harvesting, a Bartow company run by Bladimir Moreno. If they were, that fruit reached your table via victims of federal RICO and slavery law violations.
Moreno, 56, violated federal RICO and slavery laws in getting those workers from Mexico to the United States, then abusing them once they were here. He admits this in his guilty plea in Tampa federal court to RICO conspiracy and conspiracy to commit forced labor.
That combination earned him a sentence of nine years and 10 months in federal prison with $173,125 restitution to 17 of those workers. That’s an average of $10,183 per worker.
