Thread: Migrants, landscapers fear backlash from New City slaying

http://www.thejournalnews.com/apps/pbcs ... 023/NEWS07


Migrants, landscapers fear backlash from New City slaying

By SUZAN CLARKE
THE JOURNAL NEWS
(Original publication: May 4, 2005)


Workers and contractors yesterday said they feared the murder charges against a painting company employee in Mary Nagle's death would harm their livelihoods.

But several Rockland residents yesterday urged temperance and tolerance, asking that day laborers not be stereotyped or scapegoated because Ronald Douglas Herrera Castellanos, a Guatemalan illegal immigrant, had been charged in the Friday slaying of Mary Nagle.

Charles Butler, a coordinator with the Jornaleros Project, a Spring Valley immigrant advocacy and assistance program that helps mainly day laborers, encouraged people to put things into perspective and continue hiring day laborers from the center.

"There's rotten apples in every race, color or creed," Butler said yesterday. "I don't want them to be stigmatized."

Carlos Castillo, a Guatemalan immigrant who waited alongside other day laborers for work yesterday on Maple Avenue in Spring Valley, said he and others came to America to live quietly, work hard and earn money to support their families back home.

Castillo said the charges against Herrera were damaging to all day workers living in the area. He said he'd had trouble getting work since the incident.

Steve Griggs, a landscape designer and former landscaping contractor, said landscapers were worried that security questions about their employees could hurt their business.

"I've been talking to other people in my industry and they're saying this can't be good for the industry, because one bad apple spoils the bunch," said Griggs, president of the Land Design Studio in Blauvelt.

Griggs said contractors often left new employees alone at work sites and added that few contractors performed background checks on their employees.

"I'm telling you now, nobody does background checks," he added. "Unless they're hiring them full time. No way. They drive up to (Route) 59. They tell them how many guys they need and they jump in the truck. That's it."

Herrera, who was working for Coloron Painting, apparently had not had a background check before starting work at the New Jersey company about one month ago, according to Clarkstown police.

If a background check had been done, Friday's tragedy might have been prevented, said New City resident Michael Mendick.

"In a post-9/11 world, I think we need to basically know who is here," said Mendick. "Evidently, this man has had a criminal background, and he's here illegally. Why is he here illegally?"

Mendick said his neighbors were now "nervous about who comes on their property.

"They want to make sure that if they hire a painter or landscaper or somebody to do home improvement, that the people who are employed ... basically have checked out, that they are legal immigrants."

Most of Rockland's day laborers are undocumented; contractors favor them because they provide cheaper labor.

Lucille Ojeda of New City cautioned against a possible backlash against all immigrant workers.

"People are going to naturally react in fear," she said, adding that would be natural. "What do you do? You hear of teachers and priests molesting children. Do you not send your kids to school or to church? Really, the only thing that we can do is try to modify some of our behaviors."

Ojeda said she had told her 17-year-old daughter to be extra vigilant.

"I have actually said to her 'If you're at home when the landscapers come, make sure the slider is closed.' At one point I almost said to her 'I want you to go to a friend's house,' but it's silly. We're going to continue to have these people working on our properties. This is a random act. You can't preclude an entire segment of the population because of a random act."

Arleen Whittaker, president of the Bardonia Civic Association, agreed.

"I'm hopeful that we don't see any sort of discriminatory practices or discriminatory attitudes towards people in our community who do the work that, basically, white people don't want to do anymore," she said.

Gerard O'Rourke, president of the Swartwout Lake Homeowners Association, advised people to be aware and to ensure landscapers knew their employees.

The Nagle death was "a wake-up call for people to be careful," O'Rourke said. "I hire landscapers for my association and I definitely would never hire anyone without first having checked carefully who owns the company, who runs the company and what type of employees that they send out."

"I guess we get sort of overconfident at times," said O'Rourke, who is also president of the Congers Civic Association.

"It just seems to tell us that we should not. It's shocking that a company should not check out a person or leave a person alone like that," he added, alluding to police reports that Herrera had been left unsupervised at the Nagle home.

The vast majority of day laborers are good people, said Griggs, the landscape designer.

"I'm afraid people are going to be nervous about having the Spanish labor on the property," he said, adding that on Monday he requested that all contractors on his projects have uniformed employees. "The problem is ... there's no way you can find an American college student to do that work that these guys can do in one day. They're hard-working, family people."

"The problem is ... there's no way you can find an American college student to do that work that these guys can do in one day. They're hard-working, family people."

Not at what you want to pay.

I don't know who is dumber--the contractors or the customers.
Some of these quotes defy any type of common sense or logic.

Unfortunately, you usually get what you pay for.

It is a shame that somebody lost their life but the publicity about what is going on might wake some more people up. There are quite a few people out there who really don't know what is going on.

AND I HOPE THAT THERE IS A HUGE BACKLASH.

Yeah they always fear a backlash. They fear incidents like this will start mass roundups. I can only hope.

I can only hope

Me too.

Originally Posted by dataman

I can only hope

Me too.

Husker raises his hand to be counted also!

Keep hoping guys........that particular area is a Liberal haven and one that helped put HITLERY in the NY senate seat.

Keep hoping guys........that particular area is a Liberal haven and one that helped put HITLERY in the NY senate seat.

Even liberals don't want to get murdered.
We can hope to wake the moderate liberals because safety is always a concern. The ones in Teddyville are probably beyond hope. If we can get a few more on the bandwagon...............