Life inside modern-day slave trade
a number of drugs warrants and as a result of this we identified there were a number of male victims of modern day slavery. We certainly weren’t expecting to find that,” she said.
“The neighbourhood team established a good relationship with some of the people in the address and they started disclosing they were being forced to work and it evolved from there.
“It was a neighbourhood operation from the start. To me this is neighbourhood policing at it’s best. The community came forward, they raised concerns about drug use and anti-social behaviour and these victims were part of that community. I’m extremely proud that the neighbourhood officers managed to build the trust and confidence of these victims over a period of time.
“The Modern Day Slavery Act only came into force in the summer of 2015. It was relatively new legislation. It was hard to know quite what we were being faced with, but the key thing was getting the victims to speak to us and tell us what’s been happening to them.”
Chief Insp Barron believes Bariana deliberately selected vulnerable victims
“They did have a number of vulnerabilities. They were homeless and they had addictions and he clearly exploited the fact these people were vulnerable and he thought; ‘no-one is going to believe these people,’” she said. “He’s a despicable member of the community. It’s appalling that a member of the community would treat other human beings like that. “He’s targeted vulnerable people to exploit them and to gain control over them for his own benefit over a number of years. “He’s really preyed on their vulnerabilities. They were under his control. “When you are hungry and you have addictions and someone is feeding your addictions and giving you food and threatening violence against you, you do what you are told.” Chief Insp Barron believes Bariana may have got away with his crimes for so long because the public do not imagine locals being kept as slaves. “As far as anyone was aware these were local people working in a local business, and there was no reason to suggest otherwise,” she said. “But if anyone has any concerns at all about anyone we would urge them to report it to us. “This is an example of how modern day slavery can exist in a community like this. It’s not always a case of big trafficking operations and it’s not always sexual exploitation.” “Modern day slavery is not the remit of one particular type of business. It could be going on in any small business. We really want the community to be aware that this can happen and report anything of concern at all to the police.” Chief Insp Barron also praised the victims for their bravery.