Oakland Tribune

Phones buzz over Berkeley sex case

Landowner's arrest brings new leads
January 21, 2000

Landowner's arrest brings new leads

By Cecily Burt
STAFF WRITER

BERKELEY -- Like police predicted, South Asian community hot lines lit up Thursday after news broke that Lakireddy Bali Reddy was charged with importing minor girls from India for cheap labor and illegal sexual activity.

Reddy, 62, the owner of Pasand Madras Cuisine on Shattuck Avenue and several other commercial and residential properties in Berkeley, is scheduled for arraignment today in U.S. District Court in Oakland.

He faces charges of importing aliens for the purpose of prostitution or other immoral purposes, and of obtaining fraudulent skilled worker claims to help Indian citizens enter the United States.

On Wednesday, police asked other victims or anyone with information to step forward. And call they did.

Some said they knew someone who might be a victim, said Firoza Dabby, executive director of NARIKA, a South Asian women's organization in the East Bay that received close to a dozen calls. Others offered legal assistance. Still others, including Reddy tenants, called to relay something they had observed and to say their suspicions had been confirmed.

People of all cultural backgrounds expressed shock and outrage over the news. Reddy's lawyer, Ted Cassman, and son, Vijay Lakireddy, said the charges would be proved false.

But it is that last group of callers that begs the question: If anyone suspected Reddy was abusing the girls or exploiting his workers, why didn't they come forward sooner?Both, it turns out. --->

"There are different ways to interpret people's response," Dabby said. "If they had concerns of how he treated workers in his restaurant, they wouldn't eat there. If they had concerns about a lot of women cleaning the apartment buildings, they would be cautious about jumping to conclusions. It's not unusual to have family members helping out."

Dabby said people might have socialized with Reddy at the temple or at cultural events and never imagined any sordid aspect of his life. People also tend to keep to themselves and avoid confrontations, she said.

But if they knew, there is no excuse for not reporting it, she and others said.

Reddy came to police attention after 17-year-old Sitha Vemireddy died of carbon monoxide poisoning in Reddy's one-bedroom apartment at 2020 Bancroft Way the day before Thanksgiving.

Reddy told The Tribune he lived in the apartment with the 17-year-old, her 15-year-old sister and a 20-year-old woman, all immigrants from India.

Police investigators said the pieces did not fit. Then anonymous tips filtered in regarding the girls' immigration status, their family status and their relationship with Reddy.

Many of those tips are borne out in victims' statements contained in the federal complaint.

Berkeley's own investigation of Reddy and his alleged sexual abuse of the girls is continuing, said Lt. Bob Maloney, who said about a half-dozen people called the department's Sexual Assault number Thursday.

People who are being abused are often fearful of telling anyone, Dabby said, especially in South Asian cultures.

"They feel that public disclosure brings shame and dishonor to them and their families," Dabby said. "I don't think the South Asian community supports public disclosure because it's so linked to issues of shame."

And victims of domestic violence -- from any country -- often believe they are protecting someone by not speaking out. The girls may have believed they were protecting their families back home, Dabby said.

Thenmozhi Soundararajan, an East Bay Indian community organizer, thinks the fact that Reddy was a powerful man may have influenced others.

"He donates money to the temple and a lot of organizations," Soundararajan said. "The important people who make decisions and who are civic leaders may have looked the other way. One out of three people in Berkeley live in a Reddy building."

She said the young restaurant workers always kept their eyes downcast, and the girls spoke a dialect that Soundararajan herself doesn't speak.

"People were afraid to ask, and it's unfortunate because these women had no other course," she said. "There's a strong network of women who wanted to help them ... but they didn't want to talk about it because they were afraid, knowing their visas could be taken away."

That, she said, could be worse than enduring their situation here.

"If they went back (to India), their families wouldn't accept them because they've been sexually used," she said. "They can't be married and so their plight is even more bleak. If their economics were so bad they were sold, I don't know what would happen to them in the village."