Thread: Oakland cabinet maker accused of employing illegal immigrant

Oakland cabinet maker accused of employing illegal immigrants
Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

(11-07) 16:41 PST OAKLAND - An Oakland cabinet-maker has been charged with knowingly employing eight workers who, like himself, were living illegally in the United States, immigration officials said Wednesday.

Jose de Jesus Guzman-Baez, 35, owner of Pepe's Cabinets on 47th Avenue, was arrested Tuesday and arraigned in federal court today on charges of unlawfully employing and harboring illegal aliens, said the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

According to the criminal charges, Guzman failed to check the documents of prospective employees and continued to employ workers who he knew were in the country illegally. Agents also found that Guzman and all his employees were using fraudulent Social Security numbers or numbers that did not match Social Security records, and that Guzman may have paid his workers in cash to conceal their status, officials said.

Seven employees were detained during the raid and held for deportation proceedings, the immigration office said.

Federal authorities said Guzman was an illegal immigrant from Mexico. They did not specify his workers' native countries.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... KT886T.DTL

Not surprising to me at all. There were probably a lot more illegals working for him that the feds just missed.