An Albany-area hospital was accused in a federal lawsuit on Tuesday of violating forced labor laws by recruiting hundreds of nurses from the Philippines to work there, but with a $20,000 penalty attached and a threat of deportation if they left the job within three years.

The New York State Nurses Association, a statewide union, sued Albany Medical Center on behalf of those employees Tuesday to invalidate the financial penalties of that contract.

The group is accusing Albany Medical Center of violating the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, a federal law that's geared toward the prevention of both human trafficking and the coercion of immigrants to perform services with a threat of punishment.

Steven Toff, deputy general counsel for the Nurses Association, said the repercussions Albany Medical Center threatened against its immigrant employees violated that law.

"It functions as a financial penalty and a deterrent under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act," Toff said. "Those kinds of threats, whether its toward their immigration status, or a financial threat that would otherwise induce people to do something they wouldn't do otherwise, are illegal."

The nurses association is represented in the lawsuit by Joseph Vitale, Evan Hudson-Plush, and Marie Hahn from Cohen, Weiss and Simon in Manhattan.

Representatives from Albany Medical Center did not immediately respond to a request for comment to the New York Law Journal but told a local newspaper in Albany that the lawsuit distorted the original intent of the federal law and is a distraction during contract negotiations with its staff, which remain ongoing.

Toff, speaking to reporters in Albany Tuesday, responded to that by saying their duty as a union is to represent the hospital's employees, both during contract negotiations and when other matters are brought to their attention.

"We're a union. We stand up for our members," Toff said. "We have 80 to 100 members that have been working under these conditions. This is unacceptable."

The hospital is accused of strong-arming employees recruited from the Philippines to either remain in their positions at Albany Medical Center for at least three years, or pay a total of $20,000 to break the contract.

That amount is justified by the hospital, according to the lawsuit, by a series of fees that it agrees to pay on behalf of the recruits when they come to work in the U.S. Those include costs like attorney fees, efforts by the recruitment team in the Philippines, and others.

Toff said the total amount of those fees didn't add up to the $20,000 Albany Medical Center said it was but didn't have a specific amount.

But that cost isn't negotiable after the contract is signed. The agreement includes what's called a confession of judgement, which essentially allows an entity to forego litigation by having an individual agree, beforehand, that raking a certain action will break the contact.

In this case, the recruited nurses from the Philippines agreed when they signed the contract that they would have to pay $20,000 if they sought to prematurely leave their position with Albany Medical Center.

"The Forced Labor Penalty Provision and confessions of judgment are designed to coerce these recently-arrived immigrant nurses into continuing employment with AMC," the lawsuit said.

Three nurses cited in the complaint, for example, considered leaving their positions at Albany Medical Center for a different job in the U.S. with higher pay. Their contract with the hospital, though, prevented them from doing so because they couldn't afford the cost imposed by breaking the agreement.

The contract allows a lesser amount to be paid if the recruit leaves their position at a certain time during their employment. If they leave between their 11th and 20th month in the position, they would pay $15,000. Anytime after that, before the three-year mark, $10,000 is due.

But even if those nurses are able to pay the financial penalty to leave their jobs, the contract allegedly also includes a provision that could lead to their deportation from the U.S.

According to the lawsuit, nurses recruited from the Philippines were told that if they left their position with Albany Medical Center before the three-year mark, there was a possibility that they would be referred to federal immigration authorities.

"There's a threat in the contract itself that if they breach the contract and pay the money, that Albany Medical Center could report the nurse to federal immigration authorities, which could result in their deportation," Toff said. "We think this is outrageous."

That's because, Toff said, the hospital would view any breach of its contract with the recruits as fraud, which could invalidate their visas and force them to return to the Philippines.

The lawsuit is similar to one filed two years ago in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, where nurses recruited from the Philippines were suing a recruitment agency over parts of their contract that included penalties for leaving their jobs early.

The federal judge presiding over that case decided in September that the recruiter and an employment agency had violated federal human trafficking laws by enforcing those parts of the contact. Toff said Tuesday they expect the same result in Albany.

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