Siskiyou illegal marijuana sites linked to Chinese migrant labor trafficking

SISKIYOU COUNTY, Calif. — Human trafficking is one of the many detrimental affects of Siskiyou County's illegal marijuana cultivation sites. Unregulated labor trafficking is taking place with migrants from China being recruited to work in the farms of Shasta Vista, one of the counties largest sites supplying black market for marijuana.

Sheriff LaRue from Siskiyou County Sheriff's Office explained how the traffickers are finding their victims, on China's primary social media Wechat and sometimes on Craigslist. "People will come from all over and we talked to them here before and they say they're promised prosperity, and what we find is that they're not really paid," Sheriff LaRue said.

Sheriff LaRue recalled one situation off the top of his head, of a traffic victim who had kept all of his receipts from the store over several years, he was under the impression he would get a large sum of money one day for collecting them. Most of these workers don't speak any English or are very limited in their proficiency.

The victims are often provided shacks or illegal boarded up structures that are illegal and out of code, without proper heating, cooling, sewage and electricity.

"They're, kind of, left here to fend for themselves. Sometimes there's food; sometimes there's not," Sheriff LaRue said. "People we've spoken to are, kind of, here against their will, a little bit, and are going to pay off a debt by working here.

Inside of the workers living structures, there are propane heaters to keep the room warm during the ice cold winter conditions. LaRue says the propane can cause carbon monoxide deaths. It can be extremely dangerous, especially if they shut the doors it is possible that their could be a fatality.

Most of the workers are non-citizens: meaning they are illegal immigrants without proper documentation to be living in the United States but LaRue says he has seen some people with certain types of visas.

"Oftentimes, we talk to people who are undocumented or they have California Drivers licenses. Some of them have passports from foreign countries—China being one of them," Sheriff LaRue said.

Sheriff LaRue believes this labor trafficking is a problem that should've caught the attention of all the pertinent agencies, state and federal. "We shouldn't stand for that. But, in a sense, by not confronting it, we're kind of enabling it and local jurisdictions are sort of left to fight the fight alone," LaRue said.

Christa Wiens, the executive director of the Central Valley Justice Coalition, works to fight against human trafficking. She described this kind of labor trafficking as 'forced criminality'.

"Something that is often overlooked is 'forced criminality' as labor trafficking...someone who is forced to engage in a crime for the benefit of, let's say, the gang. So, maybe, they're selling drugs but it's the gang that gets the money," Wiens explained.

Wiens says labor and sex trafficking are an exploitation of vulnerabilities. People of color and undocumented people face different vulnerabilities that are easily exploited. When asked if she had seen any trafficking situations similar to the one in Siskiyou County, she says she is familiar with similar cases with people on the other side of the border.

"We're seeing a rise in unaccompanied minors as well, who are connecting with a sponsor on an app like WhatsApp and somebody says, 'hey, come on over, once you get here I'll provide these things for you, I'll take care of you, I've got a place you can live.' And then, when they get here, they're put into an apartment with ten other guys or they are in these inhumane living conditions," Wiens said.

It is still unclear who exactly the traffickers are in Siskiyou County. Sheriff LaRue says the people in power get to stay in power, in this organized criminal activity. The people who are there growing are the ones who will get detained, arrested, charged and fined by police.

In Maine, very similar Chinese related illegal marijuana operations are also taking place in their rural counties of Penobscot, Kennebec, and Bangor-- just to name a few. According to NewsCenter Maine, Police in Kennebec County received a tip from residents at a suspected grow site in the town of China, pleading to be rescued. According to an affidavit, they told police,

"We are imprisoned we were abducted from China, passports were confiscated. Only work but no salary," according to an affidavit from alleged residents at a suspected grow site.

According to the report, while raiding a cultivation site in February, police interviewed Guanshi Yani, who allegedly said he was taken to the state of Maine against his will from New York after he was offered a meal and "pleasure" while at a park. Sixty-seven-year-old Xisen Guo New York was arrested for Unlawful Trafficking in Scheduled drugs and an investigation on him is still ongoing, according to the Penobscot Sheriff's Office. He now remains in the county jail.

The difference between California and Maine is that Maine is getting the feds involved. Sheriff's Deputies investigators from the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI, who have found that these illegal plantations are tied to Chinese Organized Crime groups.

This is why Sheriff LaRue has called on the State of California and the office of Governor Gavin Newsom to tackle this issue. We asked LaRue why the feds arn't getting involved with this issue, he says they have worked with some federal agencies in the past but says they can't do a lot for state issue without the state's involvement.

"That's why we need the state government to step up and help us, because they're ultimately the ones that can help us prevent this and maybe stop it because it's just gotten so out of control," LaRue said.

We asked who the Sheriff's office has reached out to so far: the Governors office (including Gavin Newsom), the Department of Cannabis Control, CAL EPA, the Waterboard, the Department of Fish and Wildlife, Cal OES, just to name a few. LaRue says they've helped a bit, but described it as ancillary. He believes we need a push with strong legislation and the Governors office to enact some executive orders that really allow us to get some funding can be used to clean up Siskiyou County.

"Once again, it's just an environmental disaster. California, at this time, is just hypocrites—the State leadership has essentially said that we need to have strong environmental laws, then they aren't using any of them on something that clearly is an environmental disaster," LaRue said.

With the help from the Sheriff's Office in Siskiyou, sites are constantly working to be eradicated. The problem is that as soon as one is destroyed, another one pops up. Even with the hard work they do, they are only able to eradicated about 6-8% a year of the total illegal sites.

The Governors task force came up to Siskiyou County during the summer to help with eradication, but Sheriff LaRue says it was only for a couple of days.

“Three to four days...they came out and helped with eradication and search warrants. But, again, its just maybe one week in the year and its not enough to get anything done," Sheriff LaRue said.

Even in that short amount of time, Larue says it was still one of the states largest eradication efforts. "That just shows you how much money I think it was around $65 million while they were here its a tremendous amount of money in the black-market," he said.

The Sheriff's office is still deeply concerned with what is happening in their county and would like to more assistance from Governor Newsom and support from the administration. Sheriff LaRue hopes that they can work together on this issue in the future and find solutions to this seemingly, never-ending criminal activity that has been prevalent on their land for many years now.

We reached out to the governors office and visited the state capital to try to reach Newsom's team. They were not able to comment at this matter at this time.