White Restaurant Manager Beat Black Employee, Made Him Work 100 Hours A Week For Years

A white restaurant manager in South Carolina confessed to forcing a black employee with an intellectual disorder to work overtime without pay each week for several years, according to reports.

Bobby Paul Edwards, 53, used violence to make buffet cook Christopher Smith work 100 hours a week at the J&J Cafeteria in Conway, South Carolina, from 2009 to 2014, the U.S. Justice Department announced on Wednesday. Edwards pleaded guilty to one federal count of forced labor. If convicted, he could get up to 20 years in prison.

Smith, 40, worked at the eatery since he was 12 years old and was compensated in cash, the Post And Courier reported. The physical and verbal abuse began when Edwards started managing the restaurant in 2009. Smith stopped receiving payments and was forced to work seven days straight without a day off, prosecutors said.

Authorities claim that Edwards used racial slurs towards Smith and hit him as punishment and to make him work faster. He also reportedly beat Smith with a belt, punched him and used pots and pans as weapons. Edwards once allegedly used hot metal tongs to burn Smith on the neck for not delivering food fast enough to the buffet area.

In October 2014, a restaurant patron saw Smith’s scars while he was serving food and called authorities. State workers were alerted and removed him from the restaurant, WPDE reported. Smith told the news outlet in a 2015 interview that Edwards assaulted him.

"I want him to go to prison," Smith said at the time. "And I want to be there when he go."

In October 2016, Edwards was arrested and indicted by a federal grand jury in South Carolina.

"Edwards abused an African-American man with intellectual disabilities by coercing him to work long hours in a restaurant without pay," Acting Assistant Attorney General John Gore of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division said in a statement. "Combating human trafficking by forced labor is one of the highest priorities of this Justice Department."

In addition to jail time and a possible fine, Edwards faces mandatory restitution to be paid to the victim. The amount of compensation and a sentencing date has not yet been determined.