New York Couple Faces Forced Labor Charges

A millionaire couple were arrested on federal charges that they kept two Indonesian women as slaves in their swank Long Island home for more than five years, beating and abusing them and paying them almost nothing.

Authorities uncovered the alleged abuse after one of the women was found by police wandering outside a doughnut shop Sunday morning wearing only pants and a towel.

The homeowners, Varsha Mahender Sabhnani, 35, and her husband, Mahender Murlidhar Sabhnani, 51, entered not guilty pleas Tuesday at their arraignment in U.S. District Court in Central Islip and were ordered held pending a Thursday bail hearing.

Prosecutors said the women had scalding water thrown on them and were forced to repeatedly climb up and down stairs and take as many as 30 showers in three hours — all as punishment for perceived misdeeds. In one case, prosecutors said, one woman was forced to eat 25 hot chili peppers at a time.

One woman told authorities she was cut behind her ears with a pocket knife and both were forced to sleep on mats in the kitchen. They were fed so little, they claimed, they were forced to steal food and hide it from their captors.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Demitri Jones, who called the allegations “a case of modern-day slavery,” had asked that the homeowners be held without bail, but Magistrate A. Kathleen Tomlinson agreed to hold a bail hearing. The judge also ordered the couple, who are naturalized U.S. citizens from India, to surrender their U.S. passports.

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