Singh, who is an Indian citizen, first reported to local police in 2018 that she was forced to work without pay at the rural college for several months doing all kinds of work, including “housekeeping, babysitting, laundry service and helping in the kitchen.”

Galan, who previously lived in Spain, as well as Broccko and Ruiz, who came to the United States from Venezuela, had similar stories of forced labor.

“Galan was forced to work at Olivet approximately 40 hours per week. He was forced to perform manual labor, including receiving and unloading large containers full of furniture for Olivet,” the lawsuit states. “Galan also unloaded the furniture items and then assembled them. Galan never got some money as payment for his work at Olivet.”

T nonimmigrant visa, according to United States Citizenship and Immigration Servicesis a temporary visa that allows “certain victims of a serious form of trafficking to remain in the United States for an initial period of up to 4 years if they comply with any reasonable request for assistance from law enforcement agencies in the detection, investigation, or prosecution of trafficking or qualifies for an exemption or exemption.”

Human trafficking or trafficking, the agency said, “is a crime in which traffickers use force, fraud, or coercion to compel individuals to provide labor or services, including commercial sex.” T nonimmigrant status was created by Congress in October 2000 as part of the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act to help protect crime victims. Nonimmigrants who receive this status can become lawful permanent residents if they qualify.

The lawsuit lists among the defendants: Matthias Gebhardt, who was dean of Olivet Theological College & Seminary and head of the financial aid committee at the time the plaintiffs were at Olivet; David Jang, founder of both Olivet University and World Olivet Assembly; and other school officials, including Jasmine Park, Andrew Lin, Rachel Cheung, Nathanael Tran and Stephanie Choi Gebhardt.

Attorney C. Yong Jeong of Jeong and Likens, LC sent a comprehensive response to the LA Times report in an Oct. 10 letter, which CP has reviewed. Jeong explained that the lawsuit, which was originally filed in September 2023 and then amended, had been rejected at least once already. He demanded correction or withdrawal of the report. Olivet University President Jonathan Park told CP that the school has not yet received a response from the LA Times.

“These allegations continue to be completely false,” Jeong wrote in the letter to the LA Times. “The suit was already dismissed once (called ‘demurrer’ in California), and the lead plaintiff’s wife (Nogleides) withdrew the amended complaint because her lawyer advised that their actions were ‘returning kindness with malice’ (original in Spanish is ‘quien mucho ayuda, mal le paya’).

“In fact, the individuals who originally filed these complaints have offered invitations to settle on numerous occasions in civil court, which the university has rejected, as the allegations are completely false.”

The plaintiffs had asked the school for $300,000 each to withdraw their claims but the school rejected the offer, a school official told the International Business Times. Their lawyer reportedly lowered the amount to settle the claims to $200,000, but still the school refused, claiming they had done nothing wrong.

OU President Park said the students’ decision to sue the school for human trafficking seems to fit with the T visa system because they were only at the school for short periods before transferring to other schools to pursue their ESL studies.

“They got a three-year ESL visa, and after their three years were up, they claimed they were trafficked three years ago,” Park explained. “They are in the process, or may have already received it, but what was already discovered is that they were in the process of receiving this visa for trafficking victims.”

Colleen Shalby, the LA Times reporter whose byline appears in the story, did not respond to CP’s request for comment. The plaintiffs’ attorney, Darren Harris of Harris Grombchevsky LLPwhen asked if he would be willing to answer questions about the lawsuit, told CP that he had written to Olivet’s attorney and was waiting to hear back. He did not indicate a willingness to answer CP’s questions beyond that. He asked if CP had any connections to the university and was told that CP’s CEO is an Olivet graduate.

Olivet University in Anza is located on a historic Indian reservation and spans more than 900 acres, according to school website. The school offers a variety of full degree and certificate programs at its headquarters in Anza plus campuses in San Francisco, California; Washington, DC; St. Louis, Missouri; Nashville, Tennessee; and Orlando, Florida. In 2022, the campus the school operated in New York lost its license to operate after the state Department of Education decided not to renew the school’s expiring license, citing a lack of compliance with laws and regulations.

In addition to the four students mentioned above, former Chinese students Tingbo Cao, 41, and Qilian Zhou, 35, have also made similar claims that they were forced to work without pay for their education, according to the LA Times.

They also claimed they loaned Olivet University hundreds of thousands of dollars in 2019 and were only repaid this year. They told the Times the university still owes them thousands of dollars in interest on the loans, which the school denies.

In a letter to the San Francisco field office of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, reviewed by CP, OU attorneys requested an investigation into and punishment of Cao, Zhou and another woman identified as Sophia Yu “for the malicious and false human trafficking report . . . for to obtain a T visa.”

Yu, also known as Sophie or Jihee Yu, was the “mastermind behind the scheme” to fraudulently obtain T visas, the lawyers alleged.

“Tingbo Cao and Qilian Zhou, a married couple, and former students at Olivet University’s San Francisco campus, have made a false report to the Department of Homeland Security (‘DHS’) claiming they were victims of human trafficking and labor exploitation .The couple’s intention was to obtain a T-visa because their visas had expired. The mastermind behind their actions is Sophia Yu, who is suspected of being affiliated with a pro-North Korea cell group,” the lawyers wrote.

“The school had never borrowed money from Tingbo. The San Francisco campus where Tingbo lived is open, without fences or gates, allowing free access to anyone, and no one interfered with their daily lives. They regularly left campus for Sunday services at the church of their choice (not Olivet’s Chapel) in the San Francisco suburbs, supporting the claim that no one detained or controlled them, the lawyers added. “The school has never forced them to work.”

Accusations against Newsweek

Olivet University has also been accused of violating a number of educational regulations by the California Bureau of Private Postsecondary Education (BPPE). In response to the allegations reviewed by CP, Katherine A. Lee Carey, another attorney for the university, accused Newsweek of “inciting and influencing, directly or indirectly, the BPPE toward any type of adverse action by making false claims and referring the agency to false and misleading articles that Newsweek itself had written about Olivet.”

Carey claimed that Newsweek is actively trying to get Olivet University to lose its license to operate in the state of California, similar to how activists for the publication influenced education officials in New York not to renew the school’s operating license.

She pointed out that both Newsweek co-owners Dev Pragad and Johnathan Davis were at one time active members of the World Olivet Assembly, the global community affiliated with Olivet University, and that they both had ties to the school. Pragad and Davis are both reportedly no longer members of the denomination.

Newsweek is engaged in a lawsuit, NW Media Holdings Corp. v. IBT Media Inc., where the defendants include Olivet University and Olivet University founder David Jang, along with IBT — which formerly owned Newsweek — and IBT CEO Etienne Uzac. The lawsuit’s earlier claims against defendants World Olivet Assembly and IBT Vice President of Technology Younseok (Titus) Choi were dismissed.

The complaint alleges that the defendants conspired to delete 1.8 terabytes of data from Newsweek’s Google Workspace to conceal ties between the World Olivet Assembly and IBT related to a variety of wrongdoing by the defendants after IBT sold Newsweek to NW Media Holdings Corp. in 2018.

Lawyers for Olivet University insist that Newsweek has fueled an ongoing campaign to damage the school’s reputation with negative reporting. Some of these reports contained false statements on at least two occasions – in February 2018 and March 2023. The university also reported filing a defamation lawsuit against Newsweek on June 30, 2023.

Newsweek did not immediately respond to a request for comment from CP on Thursday. In one July 2022 statementafter Olivet University’s permit to operate in New York was not renewed, the school pointed to the dispute as a factor.

“As already stated in OU’s April statement, it must be pointed out that the media outlet pushing the fake story is Newsweek and the driving motive is an internal shareholder conflict. Newsweek CEO Dev Pragad has threatened Johnathan Davis to attack Olivet University about Mr. Davis did not hand over control and ownership of Newsweek to him.”