A MAN on trial at Bradford Crown Court accused of trafficking people to Bradford and forcing them into slavery told the jury his accusers had plotted against his family out of revenge.

David Zielinski, 24, is alleged to be a key figure in a conspiracy to exploit the poor and vulnerable in his native Poland by selling them the dream of a better life.

He and his family are said to have brought several men and a woman to Bradford and siphoned off their wages to line their own pockets.

Zielinski, formerly of Bradford but now living in Enfield, London, denies four offences under the Modern Slavery Act, involving the arrangement or facilitation of people to the UK to exploit them.

He told the court the Polish “lodgers” at his father’s home were well treated.

“They were eating the same food as we did. My mother and sister cooked non-stop for them,” he said.

His relatives had found homes for the Polish people, filled in forms for them and helped them with language difficulties.

Zielinski said: “In general, everything was fine. The food was the same. They were not eating worse food.”

Although there were separate fridges at his father’s home, the lodgers only had to ask if they wanted anything.

“My family was kind and behaving in a proper way,” Zielinski told the jury.

He had never seen his father hitting anyone and he himself had not broken the nose of a man called Marcin Palka in the kitchen of a house in Lower Rushton Road in Bradford.

“I never treated him like this. I thought he was quite a nice person,” Zielinski said, speaking with the help of a Polish interpreter.

Asked by prosecutor Chris Smith why the lodgers would lie about their treatment, Zielinski said: “They got together and came up with things about us. Maybe to take revenge on us.

“Myself and my family were well behaved towards them.”

The trial continues.

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