Daly City family sentenced after running decade-long human trafficking ring out of daycare
DALY CITY, Calif. (KGO) -- The family members found guilty of running a human trafficking ring out of a Daly City daycare and adult care center learned their fate Wednesday.
Joshua Gamos was sentenced to nine years and eight months in prison, Carlina Gamos, to five years and eight months, and Noel Gamos, to five years.
It was 2018 when family members Joshua, Noel, Gerlen, and Carlina Gamos were charged with human trafficking and labor abuse.
RELATED: Owners of Peninsula child, senior care centers charged with human trafficking, employee violations
The California attorney general said that it all happened over the course of 10 years, between 2008 and 2018 while they operated Rainbow Bright, a child care and adult residential care company in Daly City.
The attorney general said that the family targeted members of the Filipino community, many of whom recently immigrated to the U.S., trafficking many of the victims by threatening arrest and deportation.
They also made false promises to help victims with immigration and confiscated passports.
Gerlen Gamos previously pled guilty to two counts of grand theft but the other three went to trial and in June of 2022, were found guilty on two counts of labor human trafficking and conspiracy to commit human trafficking.
They were also found guilty of 18 counts of felony theft of labor and 18 counts of EDD labor fraud.
MORE: Oakland police, FBI take action to assess trafficking concerns near school after I-Team report
In the San Mateo County courtroom Wednesday, victim representatives read impact statements, many saying they'd still live in fear, even if the Gamos were to get the maximum 40-year sentences.
The South Bay Coalition to End Human Trafficking says what victims of the Gamos family went through, labor trafficking, happens too often.
"With labor trafficking cases, it's really hard for folks to connect with the level of trauma that happens with this form of trafficking and with labor exploitation," said Sharan Dhanoa, the coalition's director, "But individuals carry this trauma for years."
The coalition points to a federal statute that defines labor trafficking.
"The Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which was passed in 2000, defines labor trafficking as taking somebody putting somebody into a situation where they're exploited for their labor or for sexual services through the use of force, fraud, or coercion," said Perla Flores, the Coalition's Chair.
MORE: SF supervisor considers sanctioned red-light district amid ongoing sex trafficking problem
Flores says more awareness needs to be brought to labor trafficking and its signs.
"It's really important to understand that it's not that someone is chained in a basement," Flores said, "That it's really folks that perhaps can appear that they have freedom of movement, but they are not really able to leave the situation that they're in without fear that there's going to be some repercussions"
Now with the Gamos family sentencing, the South Bay Coalition To End Human Trafficking hopes that more victims can be rescued from similar environments and that the community knows what signs to look for to provide help to those living in them.
"We can be upstanders instead of bystanders," Flores said, "We all have a role to play and it starts by being educated, becoming educated around what is human trafficking, what is labor trafficking."
For more resources offered by the South Bay Coalition To End Human Trafficking, click here.
If you're on the ABC7 News app, click here to watch live
