Thread: Illegal alien says boss didn't pay up

http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles ... -alien.txt

Illegal alien says boss didn't pay up
By CLAIR JOHNSON
Of The Gazette Staff

An illegal alien told a federal jury this week he responded to a radio advertisement in Denver for jobs and was brought to the Bozeman area to hang drywall but was not paid by the men who hired him.

The men, Rickardo A. Armas and Jamie R. Rivas-Ortiz, are on trial in Billings on charges of conspiracy and harboring illegal aliens. Armas, 35, of Leander, Texas, and Rivas-Ortiz, 36, of Denver, face 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted.

Armas and Rivas-Ortiz exploited and manipulated illegal aliens into doing work in Bozeman, Big Sky and Gardiner from October to December 2003, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Wolff. One of the jobs involved working at the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center, a federally funded project for the National Park Service in Gardiner, he said.

When the center's project superintendent sought documentation on the workers, Armas lied and said he had papers but not with him in Montana, Wolff said. Armas and Rivas-Ortiz knew the workers were illegal, provided them shelter and used them to make money, he told the jury in opening statements. The men did not pay the workers, moved them from job to job to avoid immigration officials and housed them in motels and a trailer home, Wolff said.

When immigration and law enforcement officers went to a residence west of Bozeman on Dec. 3, 2003, they found eight illegal aliens in a two-bedroom trailer that had no furniture. The occupants had little food and were hungry, Wolff said. An investigation into who had rented the trailer led to Armas, Rivas-Ortiz and the alleged conspiracy.

Armas' attorney, Joseph Jardine of Salt Lake City however, said Armas did not earn any money off the backs of illegal aliens. The evidence, he said, will show there was an agreement between Armas, Rivas-Ortiz and Will Spinks, a local subcontractor, to do legitimate work.

Rather, it was Spinks who profited from the work of illegal aliens, Jardine said. Spinks treated illegal workers "like slaves" and didn't want to pay them, he said. Spinks made "tens of thousands of dollars" off of illegal workers and then called immigration officials, Jardine said. The workers were deported, making it difficult for them to collect money from Spinks, who was not indicted.

One of the workers, Manuel Montes-Raizola, from Mexico, testified he entered the United States illegally to work and provide for his family and was in Denver when he heard a radio advertisement for work. He responded and met Rivas-Ortiz, who hired him and others. Later that same day, Rivas-Ortiz took the group to Bozeman in an all-night drive. Montes-Raizola said Rivas-Ortiz met Armas at a Burger King and the group started working the next day.

Montes-Raizola said Armas, Rivas-Oritz and Spinks all knew he and his co-workers were illegal aliens and told them to make up Social Security numbers.

One of the jobs was working at the Yellowstone Club, Montes-Raizola said. The Yellowstone Club is an exclusive gated resort of multi-million-dollar homes near Big Sky. Montes-Raizola called the Yellowstone Club homes beautiful and said, "the nicest ones in Montana are there."

Montes-Raizola said Armas paid him for five days work and that was all, although Armas and Rivas-Ortiz kept saying they'd pay them "next week." Montes-Raizola said he lives and works in Bozeman and now has a Social Security number and a work permit.

When Jardine suggested Montes-Raizola was "snitching" on the defendants in hopes of staying in the United States forever, Montes-Raizola said he was "fighting for what's mine" and that his staying depended on the government.

Spinks, a sheetrock contractor in Gallatin Gateway, testified Tuesday he hired Armas and his company to supply workers for several of his jobs but that the deal soured. The workers did poor work, finished only one job and ultimately cost him his builders, he said.

Spinks said he has been "blackballed" from jobs in Big Sky. And, he said, he got fired from the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center job in Gardiner because he couldn't get the proper identification for workers supplied by Armas. Spinks said he was paid $10,000 of the Center's $35,000 to $40,000 job and that he paid Armas $6,000 cash.

In an exchange with Armas' attorney, Spinks denied making $47,000 from the jobs and said he moved workers to different sites based on whether a job was ready and not to avoid immigration. Spinks acknowledged it was obvious within a few days that there was a problem with the workers' identification.

Spinks said he called immigration officials and told them to check on the trailer but denied it was to avoid having to pay the workers. And he denied allegations he had called immigration on a previous job. Spinks said he told Armas he had to supply Social Security numbers for the workers to get paid on the Gardiner job and that he would call immigration if Armas didn't provide the information. Armas replied that he didn't care if he called immigration, Spinks said.

The trial continues today with U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull presiding.


Published on Wednesday, July 12, 2006.
Last modified on 7/12/2006 at 12:04 am

An illegal alien told a federal jury this week he responded to a radio advertisement in Denver for jobs and was brought to the Bozeman area to hang drywall but was not paid by the men who hired him.

I guess there is no honor among criminals..Who would have thought

http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles ... legals.txt

Published on Friday, July 14, 2006.
Last modified on 7/14/2006 at 12:56 am

2 men guilty of harboring illegal aliens from Mexico
By CLAIR JOHNSON
Of The Gazette Staff

A federal jury Thursday convicted two men accused of harboring illegal aliens who were brought to the Bozeman area to hang drywall at construction sites in the area.

The panel found Rickardo A. Armas, 35, of Leander, Texas, guilty of conspiring to harbor illegal aliens and two counts of harboring. In addition, the jury said Armas acted for financial gain, a finding that adds five years to the maximum term of 10 years in prison. Conspiracy and harboring each carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

The jury acquitted co-defendant Jamie Rivas-Ortiz, 36, of Denver, of conspiracy but found him guilty on two counts of harboring illegal aliens. The jury did not find that Rivas-Ortiz acted for financial gain.

The jury deliberated five hours in the four-day trial. U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull set sentencing for Oct. 12 and continued the defendants' release.

The government alleged the defendants conspired to hire, transport and shelter illegal aliens to work on construction sites from about mid-October 2003 to early December 2003. The defendants were accused of exploiting and manipulating the illegal workers to make money.

The illegal aliens, who were from Mexico, worked on private jobs, including a multimillion-dollar house at the Yellowstone Club, an exclusive, gated resort in Big Sky, and the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center, a federally funded project in Gardiner. Armas and Rivas-Ortiz did not pay the workers, moved them from job to job and housed them in motels and a trailer, the government alleged.

An investigation began when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents responded to information from a subcontractor and found eight illegal aliens living in a two-bedroom trailer west of Bozeman on Dec. 3, 2003. The trailer had no furniture, and the occupants were hungry and had little food. Agents arrested two of the illegal aliens, who eventually testified against Armas and Rivas-Ortiz.

The defendants maintained there was no conspiracy. They either accused each other of being responsible for hiring the workers or tried to shift the focus to the subcontractor, Will Spinks, a Sheetrock contractor in Gallatin Gateway who called ICE. The defense maintained Spinks was the one who exploited the illegal workers by treating them like slaves, not paying them and then calling the authorities so he wouldn't have to pay them. Spinks was not indicted.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Wolff said Rivas-Ortiz ran an advertisement on a Spanish-speaking Denver radio station for Armas seeking drywall workers for jobs in Montana. Rivas-Ortiz hired several workers and drove with them to Bozeman. There, he met Armas, and he and the workers started doing jobs for Spinks.

Motel records showed that Armas and Rivas-Ortiz paid for rooms for themselves and the workers at the first motel and that Armas paid at subsequent motels.

One of the illegal aliens, Manuel Montes-Raizola, testified he considered his supervisors to be Rivas-Ortiz, Armas, Spinks and another man identified only as Claudio. Montes-Raizola said Spinks and Rivas-Ortiz asked the workers for their Social Security numbers on the first job and that they were told to make up numbers.

Spinks and the workers got fired from the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center job after the first week, when Spinks couldn't produce Social Security numbers for the men. Armas lied to Spinks when Spinks asked for the information, saying it was in his out-of-state office.

When Rivas-Ortiz looked to rent a trailer for Armas, he learned from the trailer manager that he wouldn't rent to Spinks' workers, Wolff said. The manager told Rivas-Ortiz he had rented to Spinks before and that Spinks hired illegal aliens, didn't pay them or provide food and then turned them into immigration officials.

Rivas-Ortiz left Montana after talking to the trailer manager and did not return, Wolff said. "He gets out of Dodge. He knows he's been harboring and brought them from Denver."

Rivas-Ortiz testified that he was just another worker and was paid nothing. He contacted Armas through a friend to inquire about work, and Armas asked him to run an ad to find more workers, he said. He did not hire the workers or pay them, he said.

Rivas-Ortiz's attorney, Robert Kelleher, said Rivas-Ortiz acted as a translator for Spinks and the workers. Rivas-Ortiz got concerned about Spinks while checking on the trailer and decided to cut his losses, Kelleher said. "He left and he never came back."

Armas, Wolff said, did not use contracts, did not withhold taxes from initial paychecks he gave the workers and "didn't seem to care about documentation" or the workers. "It's don't ask, don't tell, don't know," he said.

Armas did not testify or call any witnesses. His attorney, Joseph Jardine of Salt Lake City, said Armas did not know the workers were illegal. He tried to discredit Spinks' testimony, saying the man had called immigration officials before this case, although Spinks denied it on the stand.

Testimony from the illegal aliens also was not credible, Jardine said. He called them snitches and said they were trying to please the government to remain in the country. The two aliens were given work permits and Social Security numbers.

Wolff said someone needed to testify and that the two aliens told the truth. If they had not been arrested and charged, they would have been deported. "If they're deported, they walk," he said, pointing to the defendants.

Montes-Raizola said Armas paid him for five days work and that was all, although Armas and Rivas-Ortiz kept saying they'd pay them "next week."Montes-Raizola said he lives and works in Bozeman and now has a Social Security number and a work permit.

HUH?!?!?

What is going on here? Is our government handing out social security cards and work permits, willy nilly, to every illegal alien that gets cheated by a greedy employer. Oh, this is rich.....