Thread: Restaurant Owner Accused of Hiring Illegal Aliens

First of all, welcome to Alipac, JoeCitizen. We're happy to have you.

JoeCitizen said:

These sorts of cases take a LOT of time and manpower to develop and pull together, and to be perfectly honest ICE is vastly understaffed in comparison to the VAST number of worksite immigration/illegal employment violations happening in our communities. So, basically, it comes down to triage, where you have to pick and work the "strongest" cases (read as, those with the best inside sources and/or those most likely to end up in successful prosecution). It's the same situation as that I've seen mentioned in other threads on your boards here, where ICE tends to target illegals with criminal convictions as opposed to just rounding up every illegal out there...I talk to ICE agents about this all the time, and believe me, it's not that ICE agents wouldn't LOVE to do it all, because they would, but when you have a limited amount of manpower and a wide geographical area to cover, a sort of triage has to kick in.

I realize our law enforcement has to concentrate on catching the most violent offenders who they know about, but as those are being caught, many more we didn't know about are surfacing every day in similar hideous crimes. That's the problem with illegal aliens flooding into this country. So many of them are already criminals and have fled the law in their own country, and we don't find out about them until it's too late. That's why it's important to have the resources to catch them all, because they are coming into this country faster than the law can catch them.

I respect the work our ICE agents and all our law enforcement do and I think it's a disgrace that our government refuses to properly fund them when they know full well how huge this problem of illegal immigration really is. Here's a portion of a Congressional Committee hearing a couple of years ago:

II. Illegal Alien Crimes Against U.S. Citizens

Not all illegal aliens are crossing into the United States to find work. Law enforcement officials indicate that there are individuals coming across the border who are forced to leave their home countries because of their criminal activity. These dangerous criminals are fleeing the law in other countries and seeking refuge in the United States. For instance, it is known that many of the operatives of cartels in Mexico actually live in the
United States. Information received by several law enforcement agencies indicates these criminals are living in our communities and that they come to the U.S. to escape the possibility of apprehension in Mexico.90
The Violent Crimes Institute conducted a 12 month in-depth study of illegal immigrants who committed sex crimes and murders for the time period of January 1999 through April 2006. This study makes it clear that the U.S. faces a dangerous threat from sexual predators that cross the U.S. borders illegally.

91 The Institute analyzed 1,500 cases in depth, including serial rapes, serial murders, sexual homicides, and child molestation committed by illegal immigrants. Police reports, public records, interviews with police, and media accounts were all included. Offenders were located in thirty-six states, with the most of the offenders were located in States with the
highest numbers of illegal immigrants. California was ranked first, followed by Texas, Arizona, New Jersey, New York, and Florida.

92 Based on an estimated illegal immigrant population of 12,000,000 and the fact that young males make up more of this population than the general U.S. population, the Institute concluded that sex offenders in the illegal immigrant group make up a higher percentage. ICE reports and public records show sex offenders comprising 2% of illegals
apprehended. Based on this 2% figure, which is conservative, the Institute estimates that there are approximately 240,000 illegal immigrant sex offenders in the United States.

93 The study concluded, when applied to ongoing illegal immigration at the borders, these estimates translate to 93 sex offenders and twelve serial sexual offenders coming across U.S. borders illegally per day. The 1,500 offenders in this study had a total of 5,999 victims. Each sex offender averaged four victims. This puts the estimate for
victimization numbers around 960,000 for the 88 months examined in this study.

94 The violence of illegal aliens is not confined to border communities. Residents and law enforcement in the interior cities are also vulnerable to criminals crossing the border. The following are examples of crimes committed by illegal aliens:

90 Id.

91 Deborah Schurman-Kauflin, PhD., The Dark Side of Illegal Immigration: Nearly One Million Sex Crimes Committee by Illegal Immigrants in the United States, The Violent Crimes Institute, (2006).

Originally Posted by tinybobidaho

That's why it's important to have the resources to catch them all, because they are coming into this country faster than the law can catch them.

I couldn't possibly agree with you more, Tinybobidaho...this is a point of frustration that I am faced with on a daily basis. And the sad part is, the way things stand now even the ones we do catch and deport are often times turning around and coming right back within two weeks' time. I'm personally aware of one particular case where the illegal in question was caught and sent back to Mexico no less than FIVE times within a 30 day period. As it turned out, he also came back through without getting caught a SIXTH time during that same 30 day period...and stayed for a number of years (I can't remember how many right now off the top of my head, but I believe it was at least five years' time) undetected before getting picked up again because of a domestic violence conviction.

ICE works hard to do its job, but in my opinion this kind of enforcement can only be so effective in terms of the big picture when the VERY SAME illegals who are caught and deported return again and again. And all too often our court system is too bogged down to be able to prosecute each and every felony Reentry After Deportation case.

We've got to build the fence, and commit the manpower to guarantee its effectiveness. Once the borders are secure and we can truly control who gets in and who doesn't, THEN kicking the illegals out will actually begin to yield significant results because the 'revolving door' would no longer be part of the equation.

And thank you, Tiny, for the excerpt from the Congressional Committee hearing...those stats are a real eye opener...I'd not been aware of that particular study, and I'm going to pass it around the office as I'm sure the guys I work with will find it interesting as well!

JoeCitizen, here's the link for that committee hearing, which contains a few more eye openers.

http://www.house.gov/mccaul/pdf/Investi ... Report.pdf

And this hearing was going on at the time the Senate was debating immigration reform the first time. Committee member Senator Diane Feinstein walked right out of that hearing and went to the Senate floor and fought like hell to give amnesty to the millions of illegal aliens in this country, knowing these criminals were already here killing and maiming our citizens and that there were more of them coming everyday. These elected officials don't care. It's all about money to them, and how many future voters they can rustle up. This is what we need to change in this country. We have to weed out the anti-American sentiment and get some people in our government who will represent the welfare of the legal citizens in this country. The media has stopped reporting any crime committed by illegal aliens, and now they have gone so far as to stop reporting any crimes by anyone with an Hispanic surname, all in the name of big business, and money.

Restaurant owner gets five-month sentence

Pleaded guilty to employing illegal aliens in Mount Clare

October 23, 2008 - 11:20PM
By MAGGIE BORMAN
The Telegraph

SPRINGFIELD - The owner of a Macoupin County restaurant was sentenced Thursday to five months in federal prison for employing illegal aliens at his business.

Besim Tabaku, 34, was sentenced by U.S. Magistrate Judge Byron Cudmore in U.S. District Court in Springfield, where he pleaded guilty Aug. 14 to unlawful employment of illegal aliens at his business, Toni's Family Restaurant in Mount Clare.

Cudmore also fined Tabaku $27,000 and ordered him to undergo one year of supervision after his release from prison.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Gregory M. Gilmore prosecuted the case against Tabaku. Gilmore said Thursday that evidence presented in court showed agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) conducted an enforcement action May 28 at the restaurant, where four illegal aliens employed by Tabaku were detained.

Gilmore said the illegal aliens told the agents they all worked for Tabaku at the restaurant, where they worked 40 hours per week and, in some cases, as many as 70 hours per week. The aliens told authorities they were paid from $300 to $650 per week in cash.

"Tabaku originally told agents that three of the aliens had allegedly shown him green cards and that he denied paying any of them in cash, stating that he paid them by check," Gilmore said.

However, when Tabaku pleaded guilty on Aug. 14, he admitted to knowingly hiring illegal aliens. The investigation also revealed that Tabaku had paid the illegal aliens in cash.

The court also found that during an ICE operation on April 10, five Hispanic males were detained at a home located at 317 N. Illinois St., in Benld, that was owned by Tabaku.

"All five Hispanic males admitted they were illegal residents of the country and stated they had never shown Tabaku any documentation of green card status, and that they all worked for Tabaku at his restaurant and were paid in cash," Gilmore said.

In total, nine illegal aliens were found to be working for Tabaku and residing at the Benld home that Tabaku owned. All nine illegal aliens were deported to Mexico.

Tabaku told the court that he had come to the United States in 1999 as a political asylum seeker from the Republic of Albania. Tabaku and his wife, Gentiana, co-own the restaurant.

"His wife was not involved in the court case and was not charged with any wrongdoing," Gilmore said. "Tabaku said she simply worked with him at the restaurant."

At Thursday's sentencing, the judge allowed Tabaku 30 days to get his affairs in order before leaving to serve his prison sentence.

"We want to thank agents of the U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement for their very thorough and professional investigation, and the assistance of the Gillespie Police Department," Gilmore said.


www.thetelegraph.com

Glad to read this Jean.

Ephesians 4:32

Thanks for the update

Added to Home Page
http://www.alipac.us/article3670.html

This one turned out really well, imo...the maximum penalty listed for the offense charged (Illegal Employment of Aliens) is 6 months of incarceration and a fine of $3,000.00 per alien proven to be employed illegally.

In light of that, getting the offender sentenced to just one month shy of the max, with the maximum fine for all nine illegals, plus 1 year probation seems to me to be very good news indeed! At the very least it shows that the courts in this case took the offense very seriously.

this is good but I want to see more of the big company execs who hire 100's of illegals to go to jail. Also we need a lot more holding facilities so ice will stop releasing these illegals to work untill their cases come up.