In Boston, the gulag may be as close as the corner pizza shop.
Stavros Papantoniadis (photo, left), 48, owner of a pizza chain, was convicted of forced labor on Friday, June 7, 2024 (details here).
According to a Boston legal aid office, he hired illegal immigrants and used threats, intimidation, and physical violence to make them work “over 80 hours a week for little or no pay” (read story here).
He allegedly knocked a worker’s teeth out and kicked him so hard in the genitals the man needed surgery.
The abuse went on for years, until he was arrested in March 2023 and a federal magistrate ordered him held without bail (see stories here and here). Well, he’s probably going to lose his business now. He could get 20 years in prison, and I assume he can be made to pay back wages.
A former tenant says he was a lousy landlord, too (read that story here).
