http://wcco.com/local/local_story_095162724.html

Apr 5, 2006 3:27 pm US/Central

Company President Said Police Harassing Immigrants

(AP) Washburn, N.D. The president of a construction company helping build the Blue Flint Ethanol plant near Underwood, Minn. says local police are harassing foreign workers, a claim McLean County Sheriff Don Charging denies.

Deputies over the weekend detained six people from Guatemala and one from Mexico who were working on the plant, after finding some of them hiding in back bedrooms in an apartment.

Six of them were given notice to appear at federal immigration court in Minneapolis on May 1, while the seventh will be prosecuted for illegally re-entering the country because he has already been deported once, authorities said.

Tim Counts, a spokesman for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in Minneapolis, said immigration hearings verify whether someone is in the country legally.

Dave McCormick, president of McCormick Construction of Rockford, Minn., said all of the workers have photo identification, Social Security cards and verification of their work eligibility.

"All of these people satisfied the qualifications for employment," he said.

McCormick said local law enforcement officers are following workers to the job site and back.

"I'm shocked that these people are being labeled, and I'm shocked by the aggressive way they were rounding them up and servicing them," he said.

McCormick said some employees will not send their children to school in Washburn out of fear. "I thought those days were past," he said.

Charging said his department is not prejudiced and the officers are aware of people's civil rights. He said there is "no foundation" to the allegation that his officers are following the workers.

Charging said his office has investigated four reports of many people who do not speak English living in one apartment.

"There's no Gestapo attitude," the sheriff said.