A 20-year-old Pole who was freed this week from a prisonlike labor camp in the south of Italy said conditions there were so grim that he feared for his life from the moment he woke. According to news briefings by the Italian and Polish police, an international criminal ring lured an estimated 1,000 Polish farm workers to Italy to labor for paltry wages in squalid conditions. The police said the ring began to operate one to two years ago. For many of the victims, the trap was sprung when they responded to newspaper advertisements promising seasonal jobs picking fruit and vegetables.
See "Poles Seeking Jobs Found Forced Labor in Italy", Peter Kiefer, The New York Times, July 23, 2006