Thread: 11 Undocumented migrants arrested at Colorado dairy(updated)

11 Undocumented migrants arrested at Colorado dairy farm

Published June 02, 2011

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Denver – U.S. immigration authorities and local law enforcement personnel arrested 11 undocumented immigrants Wednesday at a dairy farm in eastern Colorado after a grand jury indicted a score of the farm's employees on charges they used false documents to get hired.

The operation at the Wildcat Dairy in Fort Morgan, about 80 miles from Denver, was the result of a "routine" review of the employment eligibility forms, or I-9s, submitted by the farm's employees, Immigration and Customs Enforcement said.

ICE determined that 53 Wildcat employees - representing 89 percent of the farm's workforce - lacked authorization to work in the United States.

The federal agency conveyed that information to the Morgan County Sheriff's Office and a county grand jury issued indictments last week for 20 Wildcat Dairy employees from Mexico and Central America accused of using forged Social Security and alien registration cards.

Eleven of the indicted workers were apprehended Wednesday and the other nine remain at large. All 20 face charges of criminal impersonation.

Morgan County Sheriff's deputies and Fort Morgan police took part in Wednesday's raid on the farm, ICE said.

The 11 people in custody are being held without bail in Fort Morgan, a town of 28,000 residents that is more than one-third Hispanic, according to 2010 Census figures.

David Marwell, Special Agent in Charge of ICE Homeland Security Investigations in Denver, stressed the importance of keeping government-issued credentials out of the hands of forgers who can use sophisticated equipment to create "high-quality false documents."

The 20 Wildcat employers indicted in Morgan County represent only "the most notable" immigration violations going on at the dairy farm, Marwell said.

"The management of Wildcat Dairy cooperated with the arrest operations" and will not face any charges, the Morgan County Sheriff's Office said in a statement.

Wildcat Dairy produces wheat and corn as well as dairy products and receives federal farm subsidies in the range of $20,000 to $42,000 a year.

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Farm left with few workers after immigration raid

10:35 PM, Jun 1, 2011

FORT MORGAN - A dairy farm was the target of a raid by immigration officials and local authorities Wednesday. Law enforcement officers removed nearly all of the workers, suspected to be illegal immigrants. Some of them are facing criminal charges for using stolen identities.

Eleven men are being held without bond in the Morgan County jail on state charges of identity theft. One of the workers also had an outstanding warrant for car theft in California.

The other 40 or so workers who were in the country illegally but with no criminal record were allowed to go free.

The 11 workers in custody are accused of using fake documents to get jobs at the Wildcat Dairy, which was left nearly deserted after the raid.

9NEWS found pastures packed with cows, but almost nobody to feed them. A farmhand, who asked not to be named, said the farm lost more than 50 of its 60 employees. That amounts to 89 percent of the workers.

Fort Morgan Police Chief Keith Kuretich says officers from his agency, along with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Morgan County Sheriff's Office, worked to apprehend the 11 farm workers accused of identity theft. Charges included criminal impersonation and possession of forged social security and green cards.

"All had taken identifications belonging to other people," Kuretich said.

Two of the workers were arrested at a house on the 400 block of Euclid Street in Fort Morgan. The homeowner, Jesus Avallos, says Fausto Palma and Freddy Rodriguez had been renting rooms from him for about a year.

"I'm surprised," Avallos said. "They seemed like nice people. I never asked them for papers or anything."

Avallos says at least one of the men said he was from El Salvador. According to ICE, most of the arrested workers are from Mexico, but the list also includes El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. All of the men allegedly assumed the identities of United States citizens.

"[We take this] seriously because of the impact it has on victims who have had their identification stolen," Kuretich said.

Wildcat Dairy's owner would not go on camera, but says he didn't know his workers were illegal.

He says there remained only a small handful of men to care for 11,500 animals. The farmhand told us he's worried some of the cows might starve.

"I need workers," the farmhand said. "They took the best."

www.9news.com

Related:
11 arrested for using fraud documents for employment
http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-239814.html

They should have rounded up all illegals, turn them over for deportation. Make an example of a few of these employers and the employees and the illegals will leave before getting caught. If they don't have a record then find something to charge them with. Just get them out of the country.

Added to Homepage:
http://www.alipac.us/article-6328--0-0.html

The other 40 or so workers who were in the country illegally but with no criminal record were allowed to go free.

Obama administration continues its 'catch and release' policies. Nothing new here.

The other 40 or so workers who were in the country illegally but with no criminal record were allowed to go free.

So how did these illegal invaders get the job? Did they disclose they were illegal invaders on their application and were hired knowingly? Are we to believe the 40 invaders who were set free didn't use fradulent documentation to usurp those jobs as well?

No doubt the 40 invaders set free are already working somewhere else, probably the local McDonalds in town.

Dairy workers' remaining ID cases dismissed
Plea bargains led to sentences, deportations for several others
By JENNI GRUBBS Times Staff Writer
Posted: 11/25/2011 01:38:23 PM MST


After nearly six months of court dates, continuances, several plea bargains and deportations, D.A. Bob Watson on Wednesday dismissed the charges in the remaining cases against the men arrested June 1 at Wildcat Dairy.

The dismissals mean six of the 11 men no longer face identity-theft-related charges in Morgan County District Court. They include Fidel Zavala-Ramirez, 51, Fort Morgan, Edmundo Faudoa, 36, Fort Morgan, Javier Lievanos-Patrida, 38, Brush, Dulio Cesar Vallecillo, 24, Fort Morgan, Guillermo Morales-Aguirre, 27, Fort Morgan, and Martin Gutierrez, 43, Fort Morgan.

The 13th Judicial District Attorney's Office filed the motions to dismiss just before a litigation hearing was scheduled in District Judge Douglas Vannoy's courtroom, and the hearing was formally called off shortly before 1:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Defense attorney Hans Meyer had planned to make an argument concerning the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution and how it allegedly was violated in the arrest and filing of state charges against his client, Zavala-Ramirez. Steven Newell, the court-appointed attorney for Faudoa, had intended to join Meyer in the argument.

"We had very valuable and important constitutional issues in this case," Meyer told The Fort Morgan Times. "I am happy that the district attorney recognized the serious constitutional issues in these cases and made the right decision. These issues are best left to the federal government."

Watson had no comment beyond the contents of the motion to dismiss.

Not really over?

However, the dismissals do not mean that the federal government couldn't pursue cases against them in federal court.

"The facts in this case, involving the use of forged photographic government documents, would support charges in either the state or federal courts," the district attorney's motion to dismiss one of the cases reads.

It goes on to state that only one of the jurisdictions would be able to prosecute the same defendant on similar charges, according to both state and federal law.

Another thing at issue was interpretation of the federal Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, as well as a number of other legal arguments.

And the motion to dismiss did not concede any ground in the cases, instead citing "the realities" of prosecuting what would likely be lengthy and costly litigation followed by a number of appeals and legal challenges.

"In short, the people would be required to expend many valuable -- and extremely limited -- manhours litigating a matter when it is utterly unnecessary; the issue can be muted by simply proceeding in federal court," the motion states.

It goes on to state that "federal authorities have already lodged detainers against the remaining Wildcat defendants" and could soon bring federal charges to take custody of or re-arrest the men, some of whom would no longer be considered free on bail once the dismissals were signed by judges.

It was unclear this morning what -- or if any -- actions had been or would be taken by federal authorities against these men.

No easy answers

After the announcement of the dismissals, Meyer spoke with The Times and pointed to the wide variety of issues that are involved in cases such as the dairy workers' -- whether from the point of view of the defense, the prosecution or bystanders.

"Immigration is complicated," he said. "People have lots of opinions."

Lately, the biggest arguments seemed to have been over what role states should or could play in immigration-related cases, and this one was no different, according to the motion to dismiss, as well as Meyer's intended litigation argument.

Meyer said he saw this as missing the bigger point, though.

"We're talking about families and the best way to navigate them as a community," Meyer said. "Unfortunately, over a dozen Fort Morgan children have lost their fathers permanently, which is tragic, unjust and wrong."

While the prosecution contended all along that these were identity-theft cases with real victims, they all involved workers suspected of being illegal immigrants and the alleged methods through which they were able to obtain employment, including using forged Social Security and alien registration cards. And the motion to dismiss provided to The Times by the district attorney's office does mention immigration regulation a number of times.

Impromptu rally

A crowd of about 30 family members, friends and supporters of the arrested dairy workers gathered outside the Morgan County Justice Center to celebrate the decision -- even though it may be far from the end of the legal troubles for the men.

"It's exciting to see all these people here, but it's hard to celebrate (the dismissal) of cases that never should have been prosecuted in the first place," Julie Gonzales of the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition said. "This was totally unnecessary. It was wrong."

Gonzales said that the workers' only crime was working to support their families under a "broken system."

When asked what she would say to the people whose identity the men allegedly stole by using false identification cards to work, Gonzales said that was part of how the system is broken.

"We still have a deeply broken immigration system. We still have no way to regulate millions of workers," Gonzales said. "That's not the local police's fault. It's Congress' fault. They could solve this problem. They just haven't."

Meyer spoke on his client's behalf, as well as that of another worker arrested at the dairy, both of whose charges were dismissed.

"My clients are very happy and very joyful," Meyer said. "They are thankful to be freed of the charges and are grateful to everyone who supported them."

Meyer also represented Morales-Aguirre and consulted as an immigration law specialist on several of the other related cases.

Related cases

The dismissals came too late to do any good for four of the men arrested at the dairy, though. They include: Fredy Rodriguez, 29, Fausto Palma, 26, Omar Gonzalez, 35, and Raymon Gutierrez, 32.

Their cases had already been resolved through plea bargains, leaving them with felonies and deportations on their U.S. records, both of which meant they likely would never legally qualify to return to the United States.

Rodriguez's case was the most recent to be settled by plea bargain, which was finalized and sentence was imposed on Nov. 10.

During each of these sentencings, the deputy district attorneys prosecuting the cases pointed to the victims in the cases, whose Social Security numbers and cards or alien registration cards had been used or forged by unknown parties and provided to the men so that they could obtain employment. One of the conditions of their plea bargains was cooperating with authorities by providing information on the sources of these forged documents.

And another man, Ramon Hernandez, 20, while out on bond was deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement despite his pending case in Morgan County District Court due to a prior immigration hold. It was unknown this morning whether any charges remain against him in Morgan County.

http://www.fortmorgantimes.com/ci_19411237