Operation Blooming Onion was an investigation conducted by thefederal government of the United States into alleged fraud and criminal activity stemming from theH-2A visa program, primarily inSouth Georgia. The operation involved several federal agencies, led byHomeland Security Investigations. The investigation began in November 2018 and resulted in the indictment of 24 individuals in 2021 for several crimes, including several counts of conspiracy. It is considered one of the largest law enforcement operations of its kind in U.S. history.
In South Georgia, manymigrant workers, primarily fromLatin America, are employed in agricultural work, including the harvest ofVidalia onions. These migrants are present via the H-2A visa program, which allows a person in the United States to sponsor workers, with the sponsor being required to provide payment, food, housing, and transportation for the worker. Beginning in 2018, federal investigators, acting on a tip from ahuman trafficking hotline, began to investigate Maria Leticia Patricio and others associated with her, believing that they were operating atransnational criminal organization (TCO). Their investigation revealed that the TCO had brought in many migrant workers from Latin America who had been subject to exploitation and poor living and working conditions. Two individuals had died due to the conditions, and there were several reported incidents of kidnapping, violent threats, and rape. Investigators referred to the situation as one of "modern-day slavery".
In November 2021, federal investigators executed over 20 search warrants and announced indictments against 24 individuals, with charges including conspiracy to commit mail fraud, mail fraud, conspiracy to engage in forced labor, forced labor, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and tampering with a witness. Over the next several years, many of the accused have pled guilty. In the aftermath, over 100 individuals were freed from the scheme, and advocates have pushed for reforms within the federal government of the H-2A visa program.
Vidalia onions are a type ofsweet onion that are grown inSouth Georgia.[1][2] The farms in the region that grow the crop often employmigrant workers fromLatin America,[2] primarily fromMexico,Central America, and theCaribbean.[1] Many of these workers are present in theUnited States via theH-2A visa program,[1] which allowsforeign nationals to work inagriculture in the United States under a sponsor who is responsible for housing, feeding, paying, and providing transportation for the worker.[3] Workers involved in the visa program are also required to be paid a fair wage, which in 2021 typically amounted to between $10 and $12 per hour (equivalent to between $12 and $14 in 2024).[4] In South Georgia in 2022, the average hourly pay for harvesting Vidalia onions was $11.99 per hour ($12.88 in 2024), in addition to bonuspiece rates that usually depended on how many onions were harvested.[2]
From the 2010s through the 2020s, the H-2A visa program grew significantly as farm owners struggled to hire enough domestic workers to tend to their crops.[5] Between 2010 and 2020, the number of people inGeorgia who were in the state via an H-2A visa grew from roughly 5,500 to 27,614,[5] second only toFlorida in the number of H-2A visa holders.[2] By 2023, this number had grown to roughly 37,500.[6][7] Under the system, the work sponsors are often contractors who recruit and oversee the migrant workers and negotiate a work contract with farm owners for their labor.[2]
Some advocates forimmigration reform, including PresidentTeresa Romero of theUnited Farm Workers (UFW)labor union,[8] argue that migrant workers involved in the H-2A visa program are often open to exploitation by the contractors.[9][10] In a 2023 inspection done by theUnited States Department of Labor (DOL) in theSoutheastern United States, the department found labor violations at 90 percent of the agricultural worksites that they visited.[6] Additionally, the Center for Migrants' Rightsadvocacy group noted that, of 100 migrant workers they interviewed between 2019 and 2020, a quarter had admitted to paying illegal recruitment fees to recruiters.[11] Additionally, according toHuman Rights Watch, female migrant workers are especially susceptible to incidents of harassment and violence, includingrape.[2]
Beginning in November 2018, after receiving a tip from ahuman traffickinghotline, several agencies within thefederal government of the United States began to investigate the operations of agricultural organizations registered under Maria Leticia Patricio, aU.S. citizen who was theregistered agent of ten different companies in Georgia.[12] Operation Blooming Onion,[13][14] named in reference to theblooming onion dish,[2] was organized under theOrganized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force program and involved theDiplomatic Security Service, theFederal Bureau of Investigation,Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the DOL, and theUnited States Postal Inspection Service, with HSI being the lead organization.[15] Additional federal, state, and county-level agencies were also involved in the investigation, including theGeorgia Bureau of Investigation and severalsheriffs' departments.[15]
According to the federal agents, the investigation revealed that, starting since at least 2015, Patricio and several others had operated as a transnationalcriminal organization (TCO), based in South Georgia, that had engaged in multiple crimes related to the H-2A visa program.[16][15] The investigators allege that the Patricio TCO submitted over 71,000 H-2A visa requests to the United States government and was granted thousands of visas.[16] Using the visas, the TCO brought foreign nationals fromGuatemala,Honduras, andMexico,[16] among other countries.[17] Once in the United States, the investigators allege that the TCO abused and exploited these contract laborers, subjecting them to poor working and living conditions while leasing them out to work for farmers.[16] According to the investigation, members of the TCO illegally withheldtravel andidentification documents from the workers and forced them to perform physically demanding work for little or no pay under threat ofdeportation or violence.[15][18] Investigators stated that workers were physically intimidated and threatened withguns.[15] Some were made to dig uponions with their bare hands and were paid as little as $0.20 ($0.23 in 2024) per bucket of onions,[3][15] despite some workers being promised up to $12 per hour in wages.[18][4] Additionally, some of the workers were charged unlawful fees for their food, housing, and transportation and were housed in crowded and unsanitary conditions.[15][4]
At the work camps, the foreign nationals were subjected to overcrowding and unsanitary conditions, with limited access to food anddrinking water and inadequateplumbing,[15] leading to some raw sewage leaks.[5] In some cases, the work camps consisted ofmobile homes surrounded byelectric fences.[5] Workers were constantly threatened with murder, and investigators accuse the conspirators ofattempted murder,[15] in addition to the rape of one individual andkidnapping of five individuals.[19] In several cases, workers were traded or sold to co-conspirators,[15][4] including the sale of about 30 workers to a contractor inIndiana for $21,481.[2] At least two workers died as a result of working conditions.[15][4][2] In a 2021press release, theUnited States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Georgia referred to the conditions as "modern-day slavery".[15]
According to the investigators, the alleged crimes took place in several jurisdictions in the United States, including theMiddle District of Florida, theMiddle,Northern, andSouthern Districts of Georgia, and theSouthern District of Texas, as well as in Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico.[15] In the Southern District of Georgia, the criminal activities were suspected to have occurred in the following counties:Atkinson,Bacon,Coffee,Tattnall,Toombs, andWare.[20][15] Federal investigators estimate that the TCO earned over $200 million ($232 million in 2024) through the scheme, which theylaundered in different ways, including through the cash purchase ofcashier's checks, houses, land, and vehicles.[3][16][15] Additionally, members of the TCO gambled millions of dollars at theSeminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino Tampa, which cooperated with the federal agents in their investigation.[17]
At 6 a.m.EST on November 17, 2021,[12] more than 200 federal agents and otherlaw enforcement officers assembled in the Southern District of Georgia to execute over 20 federalsearch warrants at multiple locations related to the investigation.[15][20]
On the morning of November 22, federal officials, including Acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia David H. Estes, held a press conference inSavannah, Georgia, to announceindictments against 24 individuals, including Patricio, oncriminal charges ofconspiracy.[12][15] The indictments had been decided upon by afederal grand jury the previous month.[19][21] As part ofUSA v. Patricio et al, all of the accused were charged with conspiracy to commitmail fraud, conspiracy to engage inforced labor, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.[15] Additionally, Patricio and another individual were charged with multiple counts of committing mail fraud.[15] Eleven individuals were also charged with several counts of forced labor, while three were also charged withtampering with a witness.[15] The charge of witness tampering stems from late 2019, when federal authorities state that three of the accused individuals intimidated and attempted to persuade a witness to lie before the grand jury about the alleged criminal activities that the TCO had engaged in.[15][3][12] Two of the accused are business owners, while the remainder are either recruiters or labor contractors.[5] Only one of the accused is a farmer.[2] By late 2021, all of Patricio's companies had been dissolved.[12] The accused were arraigned on December 21 and January 6, 2022, at thefederal courthouse inWaycross, Georgia.[4][18] The accused individuals are charged with the following:[15]
| Accused | Charges | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Conspiracy to commit mail fraud | Mail fraud | Conspiracy to engage in forced labor | Forced labor | Conspiracy to commit money laundering | Tampering with a witness | |
| Maria Leticia Patricio | Yes | Yes; 2 counts | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Daniel Mendoza | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Nery Rene Carrillo-Najarro | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 14 counts | Yes | No |
| Antonio Chavez Ramos (aka Tony Chavez) | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 4 counts | Yes | No |
| JC Longoria Castro | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 4 counts | Yes | No |
| Victoria Chavez Hernandez | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Enrique Duque Tovar | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 9 counts | Yes | No |
| Jose Carmen Duque Tovar | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 9 counts | Yes | No |
| Charles Michael King | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Stanley Neal McGauley | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Luis Alberto Martinez (aka Chino Martinez) | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Delia Ibarra Rojas | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 3 counts | Yes | No |
| Juana Ibarra Carrillo | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Donna Michelle Rojas (aka Donna Lucio) | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 3 counts | Yes | No |
| Margarita Rojas Cardenas (aka Maggie Cardenas) | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 3 counts | Yes | Yes |
| Juan Francisco Alvarez Campos | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Rosalvo Garcia Martinez (aka Chava Garcia) | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Esther Ibarra Garcia | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 3 counts | Yes | No |
| Rodolfo Martinez Maciel | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 3 counts | Yes | No |
| Brett Donavan Bussey | Yes | Yes; 4 counts | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Linda Jean Facundo | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Gumara Canela | Yes | No | Yes | Yes; 14 counts | Yes | No |
| Daniel Merari Canela Diaz | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Carla Yvonne Salinas | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
TheSouthern Poverty Law Center offered legal representation for several whistleblowers in the case,[2] and theGeorgia Legal Services Program took on several victims as clients.[5] Prosecutors dropped their case against Rodolfo Martinez Maciel after learning that he had been murdered bydecapitation in Mexico in September 2019.[19]
On March 31, 2022, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Georgia stated in a press release that three of the accused individuals, Javier Sanchez Mendoza Jr., Aurelio Medina, and Yordon Velazquez Victoria, had pleaded guilty and been sentenced to multiple months in prison.[22][23] Mendoza, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to engage in forced labor, admitted that, between August 2018 and November 2019, he had been a leader in the scheme, overseeing operations inGlynn,Pierce, and Ware counties in Georgia.[23] During that time, he had recruited over 500 workers fromCentral America, illegally charging them for H-2A visas and withholding their identification documentations.[23][24] Additionally, prosecutors alleged that he had committed multiple acts of rape against one of the people he had misled.[23][25] Mendoza was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison.[23][24] Medina was sentenced to 64 months for charges of forced labor and Victoria was sentenced to 15 months for conspiracy.[23] Additionally, both Mendoza and Medina are subject to possible deportation following their sentences, as both areMexican citizens illegally living in the United States.[23]
On March 15, 2023, Daniel Canela Diaz pled guilty and was sentenced in October 2023 to two years in prison, five years ofsupervised release, payment of $162,000 in restitution to seven victims, and deportation following his prison sentence.[19] On May 17, Stanley Neal McGauley pled guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and was sentenced to one year and one day in prison, followed by three years of supervised release. From July 2023 to February 2024, eight defendants entered into plea deals where they agreed to plead guilty to their charges. These were JC Longoria Castro, Charles Michael King, Rosalva Garcia Martinez, Esther Ibarra Garcia, Daniel Mendoza, Donna Michelle Roja, Antonio Chavez Ramos, and Gumara Camela. Their plea hearings were on February 27, 2024, at the Waycross Federal Courthouse. On March 1, several other defendants contested their charges at the same courthouse.[19] The following month, Patricio filed court documents indicating that she intended to take her case to trial.[21] However, on July 26, Patricio took a plea deal where she pled guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud. At the same hearing, Daniel Mendoza was sentenced to three years of probation and restitution payments of $86,787.24 for conspiracy to commit mail fraud, while Rosalva Martinez was sentenced to five years of probation and restitution payments of $8,457.26 for tampering with a witness.[26]
Operation Blooming Onion has been described by multiple sources as one of the largest law enforcement operations of its kind in United States history,[20][27][17][5] and it was the first operation under a new directive fromU.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (HSI's parent agency) that placed an emphasis on addressing exploitative conditions among migrant workers.[28][17][5] According to Acting U.S. Attorney Estes, the operation "[freed] more than 100 individuals from the shackles of modern-day slavery and will hold accountable those who put them in chains".[15] According to Savannah'sABC affiliate,WJCL, thousands more may have been affected by the TCO.[29] In November 2022,USA Today reported thatGeorgia State SenatorRuss Goodman's farm had employed a contractor whose house was searched as part of the search warrant investigations.[30] However, the contractor was not indicted in the case, and Goodman said he was unaware of any issues, but was intending to investigate the matter.[30]
In 2021, Charles Kuck, an immigration attorney from Georgia, commented that the case was "unusual, when we know that the conditions for workers that they described are not unusual. This is just people getting caught".[17] Following the operation, as well as several other cases of people being indicted on human trafficking crimes related to H-2A visa holders,[31] multiple news sources began to focus on perceived issues with the H-2A visa program and its misuse.[32][12] Multiple farmworker advocacy groups have requested reforms of the system from PresidentJoe Biden,[8][11] and in a letter to theCabinet of Joe Biden, SenatorJon Ossoff of Georgia said,[31]
This crime, forced labor, physical abuse, sexual abuse and coercion is all too widespread, not just in Georgia, but nationally. And reform of the H-2A program is necessary. This is a federal guest worker program. It is totally unacceptable for there to be slavery in a federal guest worker program. And that's why I'm demanding answers from administration officials
In 2023, the Biden administration announced a streamlined path for migrants in the United States who were subject to exploitation to file for deportation relief, which would directly apply to those affected by the Patricio TCO.[33] In the summer of 2024, a new rule from the DOL was set to go into effect that would have given H-2A visa holders more rights, including further prohibitions against sponsors confiscating their passports and allows them to invite people into their employer-owned housing.[7] In August 2024, JudgeLisa Godbey Wood of the Southern District of Georgia blocked the new rule from going into effect in Georgia.[6]
In 2023, journalist Shane Mitchell won twoJames Beard Foundation Awards for her story on the operation and the Vidalia onion industry in Georgia, "Blood Sweat & Tears", which was published inThe Bitter Southerner.[1]
In a hearing on March 30, 2022, Special Agent Julio Lopez of the HSI told U.S. Assistant Attorney Tania D. Groover that the Patricio TCO hadbribed employees of theGeorgia Department of Labor (GDOL) in order to have them approve housing for the migrants they were exploiting.[34] The following month,USA Today published a report stating that there may be ties between the GDOL and the Patricio TCO.[35] Bussey, who had been indicted in the case, had been an employee for the GDOL until 2018, while Jorge Gomez, whose sister and nephew were both indicted in the case, was an employee at the time of the search warrant executions.[35] His house was searched as part of the warrant executions.[35] Within two weeks ofUSA Today's publication, he applied for disability retirement and left GDOL.[34] While at GDOL, both Bussey and Gomez were directly responsible for inspecting farmworkers' housing.[2] As of October 2022, a spokesperson for GDOL said they had not been contacted by any government agents regarding the bribery allegations.[2]
