A besieged Christian university continues to face allegations of human trafficking and student mistreatment. Olivet University, located in California near the town of Anza has faced a series of allegations, beginning in 2018 when a 22-year-old student called emergency dispatchers with allegations that she had not been permitted to leave the campus for months and that she and other students were being forced to perform hard labor without any compensation. The call would lead to a number of investigations, including a raid in 2021 by the Department of Homeland Security to investigate claims of money laundering, fraud, and labor trafficking. Four students, including the student who made the call in 2018, have also filed a suit against the school. The California Attorney General has also filed an administrative suit to shut the school down.

The University was founded in 2000 by Korean American cleric David Jang and has attracted students from abroad with promises of scholarships and visas. Republican Congressman Ken Calvert has called for a full investigation of the criminal allegations. “All colleges and institutions of higher learning must be safe environments for students, including those coming to America from abroad. In any situation where there are accusations of wrongdoing and mistreatment of students our local, state and federal law enforcement agencies must fully investigate,” stated Calvert.

The university has denied all allegations. “These allegations continue to be completely false. Every government entity that has looked into these claims of human trafficking hasn’t found anything substantiating their veracity,” stated the University’s president, Jonathan Park. The civil suit accuses the school of confining students to campus. “At all times while Plaintiffs lived at Olivet’s Anza campus, they were not permitted to come and go from campus unless they first received permission from an Olivet employee. Plaintiffs were required to have a form signed by an Olivet employee authorizing them to leave the campus. Plaintiffs were required to explain where they intend to go, why they were leaving, with whom, and for how long,” the suit alleges.

Darren Harris, an attorney for some of the students, described how they were tricked by false promises. “They were promised to attend school, basically for free, under the guise of a fully paid scholarship, fully paid tuition, books, etc. And when they arrived there, they were told that they needed to be put to work to pay for school. They never got paid for those jobs,” he said. “They were working under duress and if they did not agree to do so, they would have been dismissed by the university. Meanwhile the university set up their visas, set up their arrangements to come there and obviously set up their schooling and living conditions.”  A hearing is set for November.