A Shopper Found a Note From a 'Chinese Prisoner' in a Walmart Purse — But Is It Legit?
An Arizona woman went to Walmart, bought a new purse — and found a note in it from someone claiming to be a victim of slave labor in China and asking for help. The woman says she had the note translated three times to verify its message.
This isn’t the first time a story like this has come to light: a Western consumer saying they have found a note from a Chinese labor camp prisoner tucked in their purchase.
In 2015, a young woman in Leeds, England, said she found a note from a Chinese prisoner in a pair of her dad’s socks, bought at British chain Primark. At the time, the young woman told Metro.co.uk that she was unwilling to give Primark all the information they requested so that they could investigate further after she tweeted about finding the note. “If I gave them too much information on the product, they would be able to track this, and there would be consequences for workers,” she said.
Primark, meanwhile, told Metro, “We have been the subject of a number of hoaxes in the past. This allegation that a note was found in a Primark sock cannot be corroborated because sadly neither the product, the packaging or a receipt has been given to us, despite the fact that we have asked for them repeatedly. Unfortunately, without this information, we cannot investigate.”
In 2014, two women in Swansea, Wales, claimed to have found alternate tags sewn into dresses they bought at a Primark outlet. The tags, written in English, called out the labor practices that allowed the dresses to be manufactured and sold. At the time, the retailer asked the customers to return the dresses so they could investigate, but noted that the styles in question had not been sold since 2013.
That same year, a woman who bought a pair of jeans at a Primark shop in Belfast, Ireland, also allegedly found a note — wrapped in a prison ID card — from someone claiming to be a Chinese prisoner being forced to make clothing through slave labor, according to the BBC. At the time, Primark issued a statement to the BBC noting that the jeans in question were last sold in Ireland in 2009 — and thus the brand found it “very strange that this has come to light so recently.”
They added, however, that multiple inspections of their suppliers had been made since 2009, and “no prison or other forced labor of any kind was found during these inspections” — and they said the company “actively investigates all allegations of breaches of its code of conduct immediately to ensure the well-being of all workers in its supply chain.”
In 2012, a Portland woman found a letter from a prisoner of a Chinese slave labor camp in a box of Halloween decorations she had bought at Kmart. At the time, the note’s veracity was confirmed by a TV channel affiliated with the Falun Gong movement. A representative for Human Rights Watch told the Oregonian that the conditions described in the letter match information known about Chinese forced labor camps, but the organization was “in no position to confirm the veracity or origin” of the Kmart letter.
While it is close to impossible to completely verify the veracity and provenance of the letters consumers claim to find in their purchases — allegedly written by the victims of Chinese slave labor —inhumane labor practices, especially in the realm of clothing manufacturing, are well documented throughout Asia.
In 2015, Human Rights Watch published a report, “Work Faster or Get Out,” about labor abuses in Cambodia. The Guardian, a British news outlet, recently published a report sponsored by UNICEF about child labor in the fashion supply chain, reporting that 170 million children are engaged in child labor, largely making textiles and clothing to fulfill demand in Europe and America.
An investigation by the Atlantic in 2015 revealed that Patagonia was but one of the American brands whose products are made from human trafficking and forced labor. The human rights and labor violations weren’t found in the brand’s first-tier suppliers (those that actually manufacture the finished products consumers purchase), but in the mills that make textiles from raw materials that are then sourced for production.
The Oakland, California-based nonprofit organization Slavery Footprint allows Americans consumers to track which brands and companies have ties to slave labor practices abroad, as well as learn more about how to end global labor violations and support companies that practice fair labor. The group is affiliated with the for-profit company Made in a Free World, which produces supply-chain transparency software called FRDM that allows companies to help flag and avoid the use of slave labor in their businesses.
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