FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — A mother and daughter have been found guilty of keeping a Haitian teen as their slave for six years in their South Florida home.
Jurors on Tuesday convicted Evelyn Theodore, 74, and her daughter, Maude Paulin, 52, of conspiring to violate Simone Celestin’s 13th Amendment rights to be free from slavery. Paulin also was convicted of harboring an illegal alien for financial gain.
Prosecutors alleged that Celestin was stolen at age 5 from her family in a remote village and forced to pretend she was an orphan at the orphanage Theodore ran with her late husband in Haiti.
At age 14, the girl was taken to the U.S. on a 29-day visa. Prosecutors alleged that for the next six years, Celestin’s life consisted of 15-hour work days as an unpaid servant, with no schooling. She escaped in 2005.
