Plea For Help From Chinese Labor Camp Worker Paid $1.61 per MONTH Found Stuffed in Oregon Woman’s Halloween Decorations from Kmart

photo credit: kent wang

Oregon mother Julie Keith expected to find Styrofoam headstones in the graveyard kit she bought at Kmart for Halloween. What she didn’t expect was a desperate plea for help from one of the Chinese laborers forced to make the holiday decorations in brutal conditions.

The 42-year-old charity worker from Portland discovered the chilling letter hidden between the two novelty headstones when she opened the kit in October.

‘Sir: If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization,’ the unsigned note, that was folded into eighths, read.’Thousands people here who are under the persicution [sic] of the Chinese Communist Party Government will thank and remember you forever.’

The letter’s author said the Halloween product was made in Masanjia Labor Camp in Shenyang, China, where laborers are forced to work for 15 hours a day without time off on the weekends and holidays.

‘Otherwise, they will suffer torturement, beat and rude remark. [sic] Nearly no payment,’ they wrote in choppy English accompanied by Chinese characters. The plea said workers at the labor camp make only 10 yuan per month – the equivalent to $1.61.

The China director at Human Rights Watch, Sophie Richardson, told The Oregonian that the origin or authenticity of the letter couldn’t be confirmed. ‘We’re in no position to confirm the veracity or origin of this,’ she said. ‘I think it is fair to say the conditions described in the letter certainly conform to what we know about conditions in re-education through labor camps.’

China’s re-education through labor is a system of punishment that allows for detention without trial. Masanjia labor camp is located in the industrialized capital of the Liaoning Province in northeast China.

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