Thread: County Can't Use RICO to Sue Companies for Hiring IAs

Law.com
9th Circuit: County Can't Use RICO to Sue Companies for Hiring Illegal Aliens
Tuesday March 25, 3:03 am ET
Dan Levine, The Recorder

An anti-illegal immigration lawsuit turned out to be much better as a metaphor than as a lawsuit.

When a former leader of Canyon County, Idaho, invoked civil RICO laws to sue four corporations for hiring illegal immigrants, the move made headlines all the way up to The New York Times: The newspaper viewed it as a prism to understand how the immigration issue split the Republican Party.

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But an ideologically balanced panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disposed of the complaint last week. Canyon County didn't have standing to argue that the companies' alleged hiring of illegal immigrants unfairly upped the cost of providing public services, Senior Judge A. Wallace Tashima ruled.

"We find it particularly inappropriate to label a governmental entity 'injured in its property' when it spends money on the provision of additional public services," Tashima wrote, "given that those services are based on legislative mandates and are intended to further the public interest."

Senior Judge William Canby Jr. and Judge Consuelo Callahan joined Tashima.

Canyon County brought in Howard Foster, a partner at Johnson & Bell in Chicago, to litigate the case. Foster's Web page trumpets his work filing class actions on behalf of "legally employed" hourly workers at food companies across the country. Foster declined to answer questions about the case. Canyon County spokeswoman Angie Sillonis said she could not comment "because we don't have a plan."

"The commission is still weighing their options and should have a decision within the week as to the next step," Sillonis said.

Though Robert Vasquez is no longer a commissioner, he is still vocal about illegal immigration.

"The recent defeat of President Bush's effort to pass amnesty for illegal aliens is a hopeful portent for those of us engaged in the Culture War," Vasquez wrote last summer in an Idaho Statesman op-ed. "After 17 years of standing alone against the tide, I can, and do, take credit for having helped defeat George W. Bush, Ted Kennedy and Larry Craig in the headlong rush to destroy America."

The 9th Circuit's ruling will have an impact beyond illegal immigration, said Marie Yeates, the Houston-based chief of Vinson & Elkins' appellate practice who represented defendant Swift Beef Co. The court goes much further than any other circuit in holding that municipalities can't sue over the cost of providing services for any reason.

"None of those suits pass muster under RICO," Yeates said.

San Jose, Calif.-based Richard Leasia, formerly a partner with Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner, defended Harris Moran Seed Co.; Juan Morillo, formerly of Sidley Austin, represented Sorrento Lactalis Inc.; and George Wood of Littler Mendelson defended Syngenta Seeds.

The case is Canyon County v. Sygenta Seeds Inc., 08 C.D.O.S. 3151.

http://tinyurl.com/2do5dm

“[i][b]We find it particularly inappropriate to label a governmental entity ‘injured in its property’ when it spends money on the provision of additional public services,â€

County immigration-related lawsuit cost $61,000
Mike Butts

Saturday, March 29th, 2008 CALDWELL — Canyon County has spent more than $61,000 suing businesses that commissioners accused of employing illegal immigrants, according to documents obtained by the Idaho Press-Tribune.

The lawsuit has been dismissed in both the U.S. District Court and, last week, by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

County commissioners have not yet decided if they will ask the full 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider the case.

The case began in 2005 when former Commissioner Robert Vasquez and current Commissioners Matt Beebe and David Ferdinand voted to have the county sue four businesses and a community leader, alleging the companies employed illegal workers who were running up the county’s costs for schools, indigent medical care, jails and law enforcement.

Commissioners hired the Chicago law firm of Johnson & Bell to handle the case. Accounting documents obtained through a public records request show billings ranging from $132 to $10,465, reaching a total of $61,626. The county cut checks to pay the firm from Aug. 10, 2005, to Sept. 28, 2007.The companies — Swift Beef, Syngenta Seeds, Sorrento Lactalis and Harris Moran Seed — and Albert Pacheco, the former director of the nonprofit Idaho Migrant Council, asked U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge to dismiss the lawsuit. Lodge agreed, ruling that Canyon County’s claimed higher expenses for social services were simply the costs of being a government entity.

After Lodge dismissed the lawsuit, the county commissioners voted 2-1 to appeal the decision. Beebe voted against the appeal, saying he feared the higher court would reach the same decision.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals did just that, finding that the county did not show that “hiring of undocumented immigrants would increase demand for health care and law enforcement within Canyon County.â€