http://www.webcommentary.com:80/asp/Sho ... ate=070614

WEBCommentary Contributor
Author: Barbara Anderson
Bio: Barbara Anderson
Date: June 14, 2007


PERMISSION FROM ON HIGH TO BREAK THE LAW

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Portland, Oregon was the scene on Tuesday, June 12, 2007, of a rare and overdue raid on a North Portland food processing plant. Federal agents went into Fresh Del Monte Produce, Inc. and the firm supplying workers, American Staffing Resources, arresting three managers and locking up most of the arrested workers in a federal detention facility, where they face deportation, according to a story in The Oregonian.
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Government officials noted that it was the largest immigration raid on an Oregon workplace for some time.

Many of the workers earned only $7.80 per hour, which is the state of Oregon’s minimum wage. Information on who worked there and the way in which they were hired was gained by an informant sent into the plant. According to The Oregonian:

“The informant told a produce manager that he was born in Mexico and had no legal documentation to work in the United States. The manager pointed him to the nearby office of American Staffing Resources, according to a federal search warrant affidavit. There, wearing an audio recording device, the informant began gathering information that culminated in Tuesday’s arrests.

In the early months of this year, according to the affidavit, managers told the informant that he could find phony identification on the streets of Woodburn. One manager eventually sold the informant a Social Security card, the government alleges.

A joint investigation by immigration and Social Security Administration agents found that during one stretch last year, American Staffing Resources had employed 596 workers. Only 49 of them had valid Social Security numbers, according to the affidavit.

Some workers have criminal records, face deportation warrants or have been deported previously, justice officials said.â€