postville 390 being sent from stockyards to iowa prisons

from the DES MOINES REGISTER:

 

Update: Initial court appearances finished for detainees

BY GRANT SCHULTE • gschulte@dmreg.com • May 15, 2008

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Waterloo, Ia. — Initial appearances for the immigrant workers charged with felony identity theft and other fraud-related charges ended late this morning with a tearful plea from a Ukrainian woman who spoke little English.

The woman, Svitlana Yudina, told a federal magistrate that she came to Iowa because her daughter — who still lives in Ukraine — suffered from a severe but unknown illness.

 

“She lost every hair on her head,” Yudina said through a translator. “She is very weak. I took her to Moscow and Kiev, and the doctors said they couldn’t treat her. Therefore I am here.”

Yudina was the last of the Agriprocessors Inc. meat-packing workers to appear for the first time in federal court on criminal charges. Authorities were still tallying the number of immigrants charged criminally, but the number had reached 303 as of 9:30 a.m.

The rest of the 390 immigrants will remain detained for immigration proceedings to determine whether they can remain in the country or be removed.

The next step in the process is the status conferences and possible plea hearings for the detained workers, which are scheduled to begin May 19 at the National Cattle Congress in Waterloo.

The detained workers in the meantime will sit in jails throughout Iowa. The jails are scattered in Linn, Hardin, Fayette, Bremer, Benton, Cerro Gordo, Hamilton, Polk, Story and Boone counties. More than a dozen workers are going to the Newton Correctional Facility, a state prison.

This morning’s hearings concludes three days of initial appearances that included as many as 10 immigrants at a time.

Criminal docket alarms attorneys By JENNIFER JACOBS • jejacobs@dmreg.com • May 15, 2008 Read Comments(9) Recommend Print this page E-mail this article Share this article: Del.icio.us Facebook Digg Reddit Newsvine What’s this? Waterloo, Ia. – Detainees from the Postville raid will move through the criminal process before they begin separate court hearings on being in the country illegally, federal immigration officials said Wednesday. That development alarms immigration attorneys who said if the detainees plead guilty of a crime, they will be immediately deported – even if they would have been eligible to stay in the United States. “It could have sort of horrific immigration consequences,” Des Moines immigration lawyer Nancy Robertson said.   An action alert was sent out Wednesday asking Iowans to help push the U.S. attorney’s office in Cedar Rapids to allow detainees who face criminal charges to first consult with an immigration attorney before signing any agreement with their public defenders. More than 135 workers are accused of using false documents to obtain a job at Agriprocessors Inc., the nation’s largest kosher meat processing plant. Some workers were charged with aggravated identity theft, which involves using an actual person’s Social Security number. Others were charged with using a fake Social Security number. “If there’s evidence of criminal behavior, that takes precedence over the administrative hearings,” said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman Tim Counts. “That’s a common occurrence in immigration law enforcement.” Immigration lawyers said that in typical ICE raids, only a few people are charged criminally. “This is new. This is what I consider a new development in enforcement tactics,” said Ames immigration lawyer JoAnn Barten. Immigration lawyers weren’t allowed access to clients until late Tuesday night, which troubled staff at the National Immigrant Justice Center. The main concern is whether detainees were pressured to sign a deportation agreement and waive their right to see a judge, said the center’s Tara Tidwell Cullen. Stipulated removal orders mean the person is barred from re-entering the United States for 10 years. “We have experienced with our clients that language barriers and misunderstandings often lead to people signing these orders without fully understanding what they are or what the consequences are,” Tidwell Cullen said. Although people in criminal proceedings all end up with a lawyer, undocumented workers in immigration proceedings must seek one on their own – and some don’t realize that, Iowa City immigration lawyer Laz Pittman said. A Postville detainee could stay in the United States if, for example, he or she was a victim of persecution in his or her home country, a victim of a violent crime here, or if a judge waives deportation based on family ties or contributions to the community.

Experts see charges for plant’s managers

By JENNIFER JACOBS • jejacobs@dmreg.com • May 15, 2008

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Waterloo, Ia. - Federal authorities are tight-lipped about whether managers at the Postville meat processing plant could face charges for employing or mistreating immigrants who were in the United States illegally.

But immigration experts who closely follow raids across the country say they think charges will come soon.

“The raid is usually another step in the investigation of management,” said Lori Chesser, a Des Moines immigration lawyer who is on the American Immigration Lawyers Association’s Interior Enforcement Committee and a liaison committee for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

 

ICE officials usually seek to gain information in raids that can be used to charge management, Chesser said.

If immigrants cooperate with investigators, they can get a visa in certain circumstances or reduced charges in a plea agreement, she said. Management is usually not charged during the raid, she said.

On Monday, federal immigration officials arrested 390 people during a raid at Agriprocessors Inc., the nation’s largest kosher meat processing plant. Arrest warrants were issued for a total of 697 people who work at the plant, according to court documents.

A list of people detained in the raid

The raid was the largest in U.S. history, according to federal prosecutors.

Staff with the U.S. attorney’s office in Cedar Rapids have refused to say whether they intend to charge members of the Rubashkin family or other Agriprocessors managers. Workers told federal agents that Aaron Rubashkin, who lives in New York, is the owner, and that day-to-day operations are led by Heseshy and Sholom Rubashkin.

But in an affidavit written before the raid, special agents say they have gathered evidence over the past two years that Agriprocessors harbored and hired illegal immigrants, both felonies.

“This affidavit sets forth some, but not all, of the information ICE and other law enforcement officers possess concerning potential violations of the above-referenced statutes and potentially other criminal laws,” wrote David Hoagland, an ICE senior special agent.

An affidavit is a summary of evidence authorities use to prove probable cause for a search warrant.

A spokesman for Agriprocessors, Jim Fallon of Kansas City, said Wednesday that the company is cooperating with federal officials in their investigation. He declined to comment on possible corporate responsibility for immigration violations because the investigation is still under way.

In the past couple years, the federal government has intensified its enforcement efforts against managers, human resources staff and chief executives, said Jeanne Butterfield, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based American Immigration Lawyers Association.

Federal officials have levied stiff personal fines and have gone after company assets, Butterfield said.

In 2002, 25 employers were arrested on charges of unlawfully employing undocumented workers. Criminal fines totaled $600,000 in 2003.

In 2007, 863 employers were arrested on criminal charges and 4,077 on administrative charges, according to ICE statistics. Over $30 million in fines and other payments were secured.

For example, California fencing contractor Mel Kay was charged for knowingly hiring illegal workers, fined $5 million and sentenced in March 2007 to a six-month prison term that was reduced to home confinement.

Some of the federal statutes that can be used to bring charges against management include harboring, or knowingly hiring, 10 or more undocumented immigrants during a 12-month period. Obstruction of justice is sometimes used, as well as conspiracy to violate immigration law, lawyers said.

Charges can also be brought if there were violations of labor, safety or health laws.

But there’s still a disconnect between what government officials say and what they do, said Angela Maria Kelley, director of the Immigration Policy Center at the American Immigration Law Foundation.

Of the workplace arrests in 2007, 98 percent were workers and 2 percent were employers, Kelley said.

“The truth is that our government could go after employers for wage and hour violations and a host of other labor violations, but the bull’s-eye remains on the immigrant workers,” Kelley said.

On Tuesday, two busloads of workers arrived at Agriprocessors to replace workers who have been detained or who fled after the raid, according to Violeta Aleman, a quality-control inspector who works for an outside contractor.

Aleman said that she saw the new workers Wednesday and that they were working in the beef and poultry sections of the plant.

Register staff writers William Petroski, Cynthia Reynaud, Nigel Duara and Grant Schulte contributed to this report.

Scores attend hearings, go to jail

BY GRANT SCHULTE • gschulte@dmreg.com • May 15, 2008

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Waterloo, Ia. - The suspected illegal immigrants who entered a converted ballroom Wednesday to face federal identity theft and fraud-related charges shuffled to their seats, spoke softly, and glanced at their new lawyers.

Paul Zoss, a federal magistrate, identified dozens of the men by name and slowly explained their rights through an interpreter. A man in one of the groups – a Guatemalan in his 20s – raised his hand.

 

“I have a question,” he said through the interpreter. “Do we have to go through this process? Is there any way to accelerate the proceedings, so we can return to our homes?”

More than 100 immigrants detained this week in a sweep at a Postville meatpacking plant went before federal judges to face charges that include aggravated identity theft and misuse of a Social Security number. Court hearings were expected to continue as federal prosecutors charge more Agriprocessors Inc. employees with being in the United States with false identification.

Federal authorities have so far charged 154 of the 390 detainees, U.S. Attorney spokesman Bob Teig said. All but 10 are men.

The workers walked through the courtroom Wednesday in waves of roughly 10, shackled at the wrists, waist and ankles. Translators conveyed the proceedings via headset microphones.

The workers then met in groups with attorneys and were taken to local jails, where they were scheduled to meet individually with their lawyers.

The hearings began with the first nine women who face charges. They said little more than their names as the magistrate addressed them.

They were followed by 10 groups of male detainees, clad mostly in dark blue sweaters, jeans and work boots.

None could afford an attorney, they said. When asked if they wanted to keep their court-appointed lawyer, one man asked: “If I don’t fight deportation, can I just be sent home to Guatemala?”

Misuse of a Social Security number is a felony punishable by a maximum five-year prison sentence. Aggravated identity theft carries a possible maximum two-year sentence.

Federal authorities expect to have the initial hearings concluded by today, Teig said.