Two Sask. men found guilty of trafficking newcomer

Guilty verdicts have been handed down after a human trafficking trial that took nearly two years to conclude, involved two Sask. MLAs and filled the courtroom with details of a harrowing experience for a newcomer to Canada.

Earlier this month, Sohel Haider and Mohammed Masum were both found guilty of human trafficking, while Masum was also found guilty of three counts of sexual assault. They’re expected to be sentenced in October.

Court heard the woman, whose name is under a publication ban, came to Canada from Bangladesh. She started out in Toronto but came to Saskatchewan after finding work through the federal government’s job bank.

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The restaurant she applied to was in Gull Lake, operated by Haider. He told her he would help her get a work permit and would pay her $1,000 a month along with free room and board.

She arrived in September 2022 and was immediately put to work, regularly working 12 hours a day with only one half-hour break for lunch, working six days a week.

Haider repeatedly pushed off her questions about her work permit application, telling her to be patient, and didn’t pay her for months.

There she met Sask. Party MLA Doug Steele, who testified at trial. She complained that she might have to go home soon, and Steele told her to call him if she had any problems.

In November, Haider told the woman he couldn’t get her a work permit in Gull Lake, so he would be sending her to work at a restaurant in Tisdale. Haider drove her part of the way and then gave her to Masum, who owned the restaurant in Tisdale and would take her the rest of the way.

At that new restaurant, she again worked long days. She again asked Haider about her work permit, but he told her she would have to pay tens of thousands of dollars to get it – she didn’t have that kind of money, and they eventually agreed for Haider to drop the price to $12,000 and she would pay it in $1,000 monthly instalments.

While working in Tisdale, she was required to accompany Masum on trips to buy supplies in Saskatoon for the restaurant. On one such trip, court heard Masum took her passport and wouldn’t give it back.

The woman explained to the court that the situation with Masum eventually devolved into multiple sexual assaults at different times in his vehicle, at work and in her home, including physically forcing himself on her and coercion. He eventually gave her back her passport after one such assault.

In January, she managed to get her work permit in Edmonton, but it had different information on it, like that she was employed at a diner in Elrose.

After an altercation at work with another employee, Haider called the woman and told her she must do whatever they told her, threatening to cancel her work permit.

She and Steele had kept in touch during this time by text message. She eventually called him asking for help, and Steele sent another Sask. Party MLA, Hugh Nerlien, to the restaurant. He sat in her section and surreptitiously handed her his business card and a paper with contact information for an immigration services worker, Jody Campbell.

She found Campbell’s office within a day or two but continued working at the restaurant.

After prodding from her, Masum took her to Elrose to work at the diner on her work permit. On the drive, Masum threatened her, telling her if she talked to anyone it wouldn’t be good for her, and that he could call the woman’s husband in Bangladesh and ruin her life.

In Elrose, the woman was led to where she would be living, which was a bare concrete basement with a single bed and a bathroom without a door.

Court heard that she called Campbell and Steele right away and asked them to help her. Three days later, Campbell and Steele sent a man to get her and her belongings and left town immediately, heading to Swift Current.

Over about five months, she said she was paid about $3,500 in cash by Masum – Haider paid her nothing.

Both Haider and Masum came to Canada from Bangladesh and are permanent residents. Each of them denied the allegations against them in their testimony – Haider said he tried to send the woman back to Toronto, but she asked him to stay. Masum denied the woman ever worked in his restaurant and denied any inappropriate contact between the two.

Justice Miguel Martinez wrote in his decision that he didn’t find either of the men to be credible, saying he found aspects of Haider’s evidence to be implausible, self-serving or not worthy of belief.

“None of this explanation rings true,” read Martinez’s decision.

He said the woman’s evidence was credible and reliable, and she presented as a shy but careful witness.

Martinez convicted the two men, saying he had no reasonable doubt about either of their guilt.