Thread: Federal probe targets area firm for hiring illegals

http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=404284

Federal probe targets area firm
Pewaukee's Reich suspected of hiring illegal immigrants
By GINA BARTON
gbarton@journalsentinel.com
Posted: Feb. 25, 2006
Federal authorities are investigating a Pewaukee company accused of employing more than 50 illegal immigrants at job sites around the country.

If the allegations against Reich Installation Services prove true, the company could be fined $10,000 per hiring violation and its executives could face prison time.

So far, criminal charges have not been filed, but a criminal investigation that began last year is continuing, according to officials at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. attorney's office for the Western District of Missouri.

Possible charges could include conspiracy, money laundering and harboring, transporting and encouraging illegal aliens to reside in the United States, according to court records.

Milwaukee immigration attorney Jerry Grzeca, who is representing Reich, said the company did not intend to violate the law.

"Those charges certainly go beyond the scope of what we're dealing with in this situation," he said. "Reich is working diligently and extremely hard on remedying the situation."

Reich installs shelves, racks and conveyor systems as a subcontractor at retailers' warehouses and at factories, according to the company's Web site and federal authorities.

Twenty-eight Reich employees were arrested for being in the country illegally last week at a Schreiber Foods construction site in Carthage, Mo., according to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. Earlier busts netted at least 29 more illegal Reich workers on jobs at Wal-Mart distribution centers in Frackville, Pa., and North Platte, Neb.

In a statement after the Missouri arrests, Elissa Brown, who oversees the agency's operations in Missouri and Wisconsin, said: "Employers must get the message that hiring illegal aliens is against the law. ICE will especially scrutinize those employers who are repeatedly identified in these operations."

Arrests in Pennsylvania
The investigation began in the fall of 2005, when a union official complained to his congressman about many Spanish-speaking workers being paid below the prevailing wage at the Pennsylvania site, according to court records. Some 125 foreign nationals from at least six subcontracting companies were arrested there, according to the agency. At least 15 of those were employed by Reich.

Nine of those illegal immigrants told authorities that the Reich foreman knew they were in the country illegally, according to an affidavit filed in support of a search warrant. The company also "was renting four apartments in which their illegal alien employees were living," the affidavit says.

In Missouri, two confidential informants who also work in the shelving installation industry told authorities that Reich "has consistently undercut its competitors by as much as 30% on construction bids" over the past three years, the affidavit says. Over the same time period, the informants said, they noticed "a marked increase in the number of Hispanic persons employed by Reich." On the Schreiber Foods distribution center's construction site, Reich employed just two non-Hispanic workers, both of whom are supervisors, the informants said.

Two of those arrested in Pennsylvania went on to work for Reich again in Nebraska while awaiting immigration hearings, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

One of the people arrested there last week had a Wisconsin driver's license that listed Reich's Pewaukee headquarters as her home address, according to the affidavit.

Reich attorney Grzeca said the company was unaware of either of those situations.

"Employers are not guarantors of their employees' citizenship," he said.

Sometimes, it is difficult for employers to tell if citizenship documents presented by potential workers are false or forged, Grzeca said. Reich hired him in December 2005 to counsel them about the review of such documents, he said.

Most of the illegal workers arrested at the Missouri site said they were from Mexico, according to agency spokesman Carl Rusnok. The Nebraska workers were Mexican nationals. Those arrested in Pennsylvania were from Mexico, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

Deportations possible
Several things could happen to the workers now, Rusnok said. Some may be deported, while some may be offered the option of voluntarily returning to Mexico. Anyone who has been deported before or who has a criminal background could face federal criminal charges.

Rusnok would not say whether Green Bay-based Schreiber Foods is suspected of wrongdoing.

Schreiber Foods spokeswoman Deborah Van Dyk said no Schreiber employees were arrested, and the company has not been contacted by any federal investigators. Company officials were unaware that subcontractors may have been employing illegal workers, she said.

"We had absolutely no reason to believe that was occurring," she said.

As a result of the arrests, Schreiber is in the process of reviewing its policies for subcontractors, Van Dyk said.

Wal-Mart has cooperated fully with the investigation, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Last year, Wal-Mart settled a civil complaint with the federal government for $11 million after an investigation into illegal immigrants who worked for Wal-Mart's cleaning contractors between 1998 and 2003. Wal-Mart did not admit wrongdoing in paying the settlement. Twelve contractors paid the government an additional $4 million, and the contract companies pleaded guilty to criminal immigration charges, according to the agency.



From the Feb. 26, 2006 editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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"We had absolutely no reason to believe that was occurring," she said.

Originally Posted by had_enuf

"We had absolutely no reason to believe that was occurring," she said.

Maybe an 11 million dollar fine will open their eyes a little.