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Documented on the original SlaveryMap (2008–2016). We don’t have a verifiable source on file yet. Know one?
What happened
Mabelle de la Rosa Dann, also known as Mabelle Crabbe, held 30-year old Zoraida Pena-Canal in captivity for nearly 19 months in apartment #64 of the Cypress Creek Apartments in Walnut Creek, California. Pena-Canal once worked in Peru with Dann's sister, who lives there. Dann, who works as a real estate agent in Walnut Creek, promised Pena-Canal a job caring for her three children as a nanny in the USA that would pay $600/mo and a private residence. Instead, Pena-Canal worked around the clock cleaning Dann's apartment, doing laundry, cooking meals and tending to Dann's three boys. Pena-Canal initially slept on the living room sofa in Dann's apartment, then subsequently was banished to sleep on the living room floor. Instead of paying her nanny/house keeper, Dann charged her $15,000 for living expenses, which she kept in her debt. Pena-Canal Dann forced her to smash her radio and TV so that she would not listen to Spanish-speaking radio and get information about the USA that might help her. Dann regularly abused her servant verbally and physically, and took away her identity documents, money and bank cards. She threatened to turn Pena-Canal over to the police if she tried to escape. Dann paid a third-party agent to secure a visitor visa for her victim, though she always intended for Pena-Canal to work in her home.
Response and intervention
ICE Special Agent Kit Welsh has been closely involved in the intervention, and bringing criminal charges against Dann. She told KTVU-TV in the SF Bay Area, "It's even been a real eye-opener to me to learn of people being held in just your average suburban homes. It's modern-day slavery." The case, known as US vs. Mabelle de la Rosa Dann, is still awaiting trial at this date. Teachers at Indian Valley Elementary School in Walnut Creek, where Dann's children attend school, first became suspicious of Pena-Canal's situation when they would see her walk the children to school in the same set of clothes everyday, and usually appeared "unkempt." Several teachers, including Cevina Targum, eventually befriended Pena-Canal and she confided her story to the teacher. Targum contacted the nonprofit immigrant aid group La Raza, who helped extract Pena-Canal and contacted Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials. Pena-Canal is receiving shelter and legal aid. She will stay in the USA at least until she can testify in the court case against Dann, and her long-term status (and desire) are still unknown. La Raza in San Francisco