Doors Swing Open at Former ‘Slave’ Compound : Agriculture: New Haitian laborers report improved conditions at ranch where owner was charged with enslaving workers.

There is a new and softer look these days at the Somis compound of Edwin M. Ives, a flower rancher who gained international notoriety in 1990 when he was charged with enslaving farm workers.

The large metal gates that blocked out the world 2 1/2 years ago have been covered by blue and green pastel fencing and white latticework, and are casually swung open so passersby can see inside.

The Indian workers from rural Mexico who said they were kept as virtual slaves have been replaced by another group of impoverished immigrants--Haitians refugees who say they are treated well.

And as Ives--who has agreed in a plea bargain to pay $1.5 million to 300 ex-workers--prepares for sentencing on seven labor and immigration counts, some Somis neighbors say the ranch is not the same secretive encampment it used to be.

“It’s different,” said Aurora Quinones, owner of Somis Market, where Ives’ workers shop for food and drinks at the end of the day.

“Now the doors are open and everybody can come out. The guys who come in say everything is OK now,” Quinones said last week. “Now everybody is clean and everybody has a uniform.”

They cash checks for $180 to $200 each week, the merchant said, evidence that Ives is paying at least the minimum wage to workers. Ives has repeatedly refused comment on the case.

Three Haitian workers, placed at the ranch this summer by a Catholic Charities refugee program, said they receive the $4.25 hourly minimum wage and work eight-hour days--half the hours that workers once said they toiled at the ranch for $1 an hour.

The Haitian workers, interviewed as they walked to Quinones’ market, said the Ives ranch, just outside Camarillo in one of Ventura County’s small farm communities, is generally a good place to work.

“Yes, more or less,” said Sauveur Etienne, 19, a former construction worker. Former sugar-cane cutter Idovie Dacolena, 26, who wore a crisp, clean uniform, said his only problem is not enough work.

Even that is scheduled to change this weekend as a temporary work slowdown for structure painting and repair is completed and 16 Haitians again join the Ives payroll, supervisors of the refugee program said.

Ives’ ranch has become a principal port in the storm for Haitians being scattered around the nation as part of an international resettlement plan, said Jerry Gaspard, a Catholic Charities manager in Los Angeles.

About 200 Haitians have been moved to the Los Angeles area this year, and of the 30 to 35 who have found work, nearly half have worked for Ives, Gaspard said.

“I think the gentleman has a good heart,” Gaspard said of Ives. “I’ve been in his environment and he has a good word, a kind word for refugees. Haitians are hard workers and I think he wants to help.”

Gaspard said he toured Ives’ Somis ranch 1 1/2 months ago and found that worker benefits included free living quarters, “a soccer field with goals, a TV room with cable TV, everything.”

Haitian workers are anxious to come to Ives’ ranch, Gaspard said.

County investigators say Ives has continued to improve conditions at his compound, where a major fire erupted in 1987 and resulted in Ives pleading guilty to seven misdemeanor counts of building, safety and zoning violations.

Federal immigration officials say they have no evidence that Ives has employed illegal immigrants since his arrest in April, 1990.

Ives, 55, of Los Angeles, pleaded guilty in May to maintaining false records, harboring and transporting illegal immigrants and paying subminimum wages. He agreed to pay $1.5 million in back wages, the stiffest fine ever in a U.S. immigration case.

His farming company also admitted to nine crimes including racketeering, the first organized crime conviction in a federal civil rights case, prosecutors say.

Just when Ives, who faces up to 16 years in prison but might get probation, will be sentenced is another matter.

Sentencing was delayed in early August because Ives, whose net worth was estimated at $5 million in 1990, could not sell any of his three ranches. A sentencing hearing scheduled this week was delayed, and Ives wants a postponement until December to give him more time to sell his property.

His attorneys say the sale of Ives’ 10-acre Upland citrus grove to Caltrans is in the works because it is in the path of a new freeway. And a Caltrans spokeswoman said the deal should close within 60 days.

The price is being determined, but Ives’ attorneys say the transaction will provide enough money to ensure payment of the $1.5 million before sentencing.

In addition to the Upland ranch, Ives is asking $7 million for his 50-acre Somis ranch and a nearby 92-acre eucalyptus field in Moorpark, real estate sources said. But the properties--purchased for $600,000 and $900,000 more than a decade ago--have been on the market for at least four years.

Sentencing by U.S. District Judge Consuelo B. Marshall will follow a hearing in which both sides say they may call numerous ex-workers to testify about conditions at the ranch during the 1980s.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Carol L. Gillam said she plans to call at least a dozen witnesses. Ives’ lawyer, Stephen Sadowsky, said six Ives employees--illegal immigrants granted legal resident status until the case is resolved--might also testify for the defense.

Though dropping the slavery charges that brought the case worldwide publicity, prosecutors say they believe that Ives enslaved workers. Gillam insists that Ives helped smuggle Indian laborers from the mountaintops of Mexico to his labor camp between 1984 and 1990, then refused to let them leave until smuggling fees were paid.

He forced them to work for $1 an hour and sold them food and sundries at inflated prices from a company store, the government maintains.

But Sadowsky said the rancher is the victim in the case. His guilty plea was extorted by the government’s overfiling of charges and its charges against Ives’ wife, Dolly, which prosecutors dropped as part of the deal, Sadowsky said.

The prosecution’s basic slavery premise is “hogwash,” Sadowsky said, and its case is based on the testimony of witnesses hoping for money from Ives.

Sadowsky said the Ives ranch was similar to many other labor camps in California. “I believe 98% of this case is pure myth and fiction.” And he said that the changes at the Somis ranch are not nearly as striking as its exterior appearance would suggest.

“It was a labor camp,” he said. “Was it paradise? Of course not. But it’s not as described in the indictment, not even close.”