To:

Representative Terry Moulton

Madison Office

Room 20 North

State Capitol

P.O. Box 8953

Madison, WI 53708

 

From:

Phil Ellenbecker

Director

Dedicated Memorial Parents Group

704 Mark Drive

Verona, Wisconsin

53593

 

RE: Malinda’s Traveling Sales Crew Protection Act – SB-80

 

Dear Representative Moulton,

 

I believe that you are aware of who I am and my involvement with the SB-80 legislation.

I'm sure you have also read the attached front page story that was printed in The New York Times on February 21, 2007.

 

Young people in our state continue to be recruited into these slave-like sales crews. Crews continue to come into Wisconsin from many other states and abuse their workers here, in your jurisdiction. It is imperative that there be a hearing on the need to protection of door-to-door sales people in Wisconsin.

 

The same crews that abuse and exploit our kids are also responsible for some of the most violent crimes here in Wisconsin and across the country. Currently our organization has recorded a total of eleven deaths in our state directly related to the ‘traveling door-to-door sales’ industry.

 

The devastation and suffering that this industry is responsible for over the last three decades is beyond your wildest imagination. Our research has also uncovered over 250 violent felony cases all directly related to the ‘traveling door-to-door sales’ industry. These violent crimes include vehicular homicide, sexual assault, rape, and murder.

 

On July 1, 2005 a Menomonie Wisconsin woman was brutally beaten and raped by a traveling magazine sales agent. A recent district court decision has pierced the corporate veil in a civil lawsuit against the magazine sales companies, the magazine clearinghouse, and their owners.

 

I am in contact with a family here in Wisconsin that has lost there 18 year old son to a magazine sales crew. They have not heard from him for over a year. They do not know if he is alive or dead.

 

Currently our organization is researching three unsolved murders, three unsolved rapes and one unsolved attempted rape. All of these are directly connected to the ‘traveling door-to-door sales’ industry.

 

Over the past eight years since my beautiful daughter Malinda was killed in the van accident near Janesville, Wisconsin along with six other kids, I have done everything I can to help change the terrible conditions that continue to plague this most immoral and violent industry.

 

I am asking you now to please find it in your heart to schedule a public hearing for the SB-80 legislation. Our organizations would be more than willing to work with the Southwestern Company in finding a reasonable solution to the differences that we have had in the past.

 

Sincerely,

Phil Ellenbecker

 

Director

Dedicated Memorial Parents Group

November 26, 2007

 

www.dedicatedmemorial.org

www.travelingsalescrews.info

Home: 608-845-1711

Work: 1-800-356-9148 x161

Cell: 608-712-4970

Fax: 608-838-8367

Email: trollpt@charter.net

 

PS: Dear Representative Moulton I would greatly appreciate it if you would respond to this letter.

 

Thanks,

 

Phil