Italian prosecutors probe Caddell unit over alleged worker exploitation in Milan

Italian prosecutors in Milan have put the Italian branch of Caddell Construction under investigation over alleged worker exploitation at the site of a new U.S. consulate, turning a diplomatic project into a test of labor oversight in one of Europe’s busiest construction markets.

The case emerged through judicial documents that also led Carabinieri police to impose judicial control on the company’s Italian unit. According to the decree, the firm is accused of recruiting workers in India through an intermediary in New Delhi and then putting them on exhausting shifts, paying them too little, leaving them without safety protections and threatening dismissal if they complained.

The allegations are politically sensitive because the project is not an ordinary private build. It is tied to the U.S. government, giving the case added weight in Milan and beyond. The U.S. embassy in Rome and Caddell did not immediately respond to requests for comment, leaving the public record dependent on the court papers and the initial police action.

Court records cited in the case said Caddell’s Italian unit employed between 311 and 394 workers in 2025, and that 316 of them were from India. By February 2026, the workforce had fallen to 261. Those figures point to a labor force heavily dependent on migrant recruits, and to the vulnerability that can emerge when hiring runs through intermediaries far from the construction site itself.

Caddell describes itself as a specialist in large projects and says it has completed work on embassies and military facilities worth more than $24 billion across the United States and 38 countries. That record makes the Milan allegations especially damaging, because they raise questions not only about one site, but about how a major overseas contractor polices labor conditions along its supply chain.

The case also fits a broader Italian crackdown on labor exploitation that has reached multiple sectors over the past three years. In that context, the Milan probe shows how prosecutors and police have increasingly used judicial oversight to intervene when low-wage, migrant-heavy workforces are exposed to abuse on high-profile projects.