Thread: Rumors of surveillance scare away customers

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a.../-1/BUSINESS07
Rumors of surveillance scare away customers
BY NIRAJ WARIKOO and CECIL ANGEL
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS

June 10, 2006

"People shouldn't be scared to shop at a grocery store," Fienman said Friday about the impact of the rumors. (ROMAIN BLANQUART/Detroit Free Press)

Amid the usual signs for tamarind soda, spicy sausage and beef tripe, there is a new notice in English and Spanish at E&L Supermercado in southwest Detroit:

"Immigration Rumors are False!!! Immigration has NOT been into E&L, or our parking lot. EVER."

The display of such a sign at the biggest Latino grocery in Detroit symbolizes how recent immigration raids across southeastern Michigan and the nation have unnerved many Hispanics and created rumors about where enforcement actions could be next.

"People are scared," Laura Gomez, 25, of Detroit, a Mexican immigrant, said while shopping with her family Friday at E&L. "It's not fair. ... We're not bad people. We're here to work."

And it's not just the store that is being affected.

Down the road at El Nacimiento restaurant on Vernor Highway, customer traffic has decreased since late April, when the Department of Homeland Security announced major immigration raids.

"They're concerned about that," said Daisy Padilla, who works at the restaurant. "They see it on the news and become alert."

At nearby Ste. Anne de Detroit Catholic Church, which has a large number of Latino immigrants in its congregation, some worshippers are afraid to show up on Sundays.

"They don't want to come out because they don't know what's going to happen," said Isabella Ramirez of Detroit. "I tell them, 'It's a church. Immigration will at least respect a church if anything else.' But they're still so scared."

Other churches, schools and stores also have seen decreased numbers, said Juan Escareno, an organizer with the Detroit-based group Metropolitan Organizing Strategy Enabling Strength, or MOSES.

At E&L on Vernor, the rumors that the store might be targeted by immigration agents have become so prevalent in recent weeks that its owners took out a full-page advertisement denying them this week in El Central, the city's largest Latino newspaper.

Store Vice President Mike Fienman said some of his regular customers have been staying home since the rumors started after an immigration rally in Detroit last month. Other people, he said, were shopping less frequently.

"People shouldn't be scared to shop at a grocery store," Fienman said Friday.

"There are people coming in and saying they're scared -- that's not right. I've never had people say they're worried or scared like this."

Over the past two months, as Congress and state legislatures have debated proposals to crack down on undocumented immigrants, there have been several high-profile raids across the country and in metro Detroit.

Last month, 18 Latino immigrants were arrested in their Detroit homes. Last week, 63 people were rounded up across the region, many of them of Eastern European backgrounds.

On Friday, authorities announced they had arrested 179 undocumented immigrants in Las Vegas.

Greg Palmore, a spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Detroit, said there is no truth to the rumors that E&L Supermercado has been singled out for surveillance.

But he said there are other places in southwest Detroit -- he wouldn't say where -- that are being watched for undocumented immigrants.

That is enough to fuel fears at E&L, which over the past 20 years has shifted its focus from primarily serving Eastern Europeans to meeting the tastes and needs of the growing Spanish-speaking communities in southwest Detroit.

Piñatas hang from its ceilings, and cashiers speak to customers in English and Spanish. The store stocks everything from Mexican apple soda to 15 different kinds of canned jalapeños.

"They just think, wherever there is a lot of Mexican people -- don't go there," said Rosalva Orozco, 27, a cashier at the supermarket, referring to local Latinos. "We're worried."

Don't these illegals know their own country's immigration laws? Why they think we have to break our existing laws to suit them, gives me a major pain!

Do you hear me? A BIG GIANT PAIN!

Golly gee.....they are afraid to go to the store, to church etc.....maybe they realize that they're breaking the law....I wonder what will happen when REAL ID comes into effect?

I am so tired of hearing them claim they aren't bad people and are here to work. So violating federal immigration laws, stealing ssn's and using fraudulent documentation to illegally obtain tax payer provided services and providing false information on forms to increase the amount of payments bilking taxpayers out of billions of dollars doesn't make these parasitic illegals bad people? How about illegally voting, driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol with no license or insurance littering our highways with the carnage of thousands of innocent dead Americans, producing 50 different id's when stopped by law enforcement authorities for a variety of offenses resulting in deportation and reentry into the U.S. further violating immigration laws. Let's add rape, child molestation, murder, gangs, guns, drugs, robbery, destruction of public and private property by people from countries that had few or no laws and don't act with the civility required of people in a civilized society.

Let them be afraid to show themselves. Suits me just fine. They would not be afraid if they were not breaking the law. GO HOME.

"There are people coming in and saying they're scared -- that's not right. I've never had people say they're worried or scared like this."

This is a good thing, a very good thing! Those that have done nothing wrong have nothing to fear in our society except from the criminal element. Oh, that's right, illegal immigrants are part of the criminal element I speak of - a violation of our illegal immigrant law is a criminal violation. I'm tired of being "scared" of what illegal immigration is doing to our country, it's about time the "scared" role was reveresed and thrust upon those (illegals) that are in the wrong!

The display of such a sign at the biggest Latino grocery in Detroit symbolizes how recent immigration raids across southeastern Michigan and the nation have unnerved many Hispanics and created rumors about where enforcement actions could be next.


At E&L on Vernor, the rumors that the store might be targeted by immigration agents have become so prevalent in recent weeks that its owners took out a full-page advertisement denying them this week in El Central, the city's largest Latino newspaper.

So should we start posting La Migra flyers at our local grocery stores?? The ones where I live apparently haven't got the message yet.

So should we start posting La Migra flyers at our local grocery stores?? The ones where I live apparently haven't got the message yet.

The Human Relations Commission would surely object to such signs.

I was thinking if they think they can setup shop anywhere they please for a mustur zone (place where the contractor's pick them up) then why can't we setup an ALIPAC headquarter's in their mexican store's parking lot? Get some vans, power, internet and we'd be set. In fact just run the power off of the store and the internet too...

Originally Posted by loservillelabor

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a.../-1/BUSINESS07
Rumors of surveillance scare away customers
BY NIRAJ WARIKOO and CECIL ANGEL
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS

June 10, 2006

"People shouldn't be scared to shop at a grocery store," Fienman said Friday about the impact of the rumors. (ROMAIN BLANQUART/Detroit Free Press)

Amid the usual signs for tamarind soda, spicy sausage and beef tripe, there is a new notice in English and Spanish at E&L Supermercado in southwest Detroit:

"Immigration Rumors are False!!! Immigration has NOT been into E&L, or our parking lot. EVER."

The display of such a sign at the biggest Latino grocery in Detroit symbolizes how recent immigration raids across southeastern Michigan and the nation have unnerved many Hispanics and created rumors about where enforcement actions could be next.

"People are scared," Laura Gomez, 25, of Detroit, a Mexican immigrant, said while shopping with her family Friday at E&L. "It's not fair. ... We're not bad people. We're here to work."

And it's not just the store that is being affected.

Down the road at El Nacimiento restaurant on Vernor Highway, customer traffic has decreased since late April, when the Department of Homeland Security announced major immigration raids.

"They're concerned about that," said Daisy Padilla, who works at the restaurant. "They see it on the news and become alert."

At nearby Ste. Anne de Detroit Catholic Church, which has a large number of Latino immigrants in its congregation, some worshippers are afraid to show up on Sundays.

"They don't want to come out because they don't know what's going to happen," said Isabella Ramirez of Detroit. "I tell them, 'It's a church. Immigration will at least respect a church if anything else.' But they're still so scared."

Other churches, schools and stores also have seen decreased numbers, said Juan Escareno, an organizer with the Detroit-based group Metropolitan Organizing Strategy Enabling Strength, or MOSES.

At E&L on Vernor, the rumors that the store might be targeted by immigration agents have become so prevalent in recent weeks that its owners took out a full-page advertisement denying them this week in El Central, the city's largest Latino newspaper.

Store Vice President Mike Fienman said some of his regular customers have been staying home since the rumors started after an immigration rally in Detroit last month. Other people, he said, were shopping less frequently.

"People shouldn't be scared to shop at a grocery store," Fienman said Friday.

"There are people coming in and saying they're scared -- that's not right. I've never had people say they're worried or scared like this."

Over the past two months, as Congress and state legislatures have debated proposals to crack down on undocumented immigrants, there have been several high-profile raids across the country and in metro Detroit.

Last month, 18 Latino immigrants were arrested in their Detroit homes. Last week, 63 people were rounded up across the region, many of them of Eastern European backgrounds.

On Friday, authorities announced they had arrested 179 undocumented immigrants in Las Vegas.

Greg Palmore, a spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Detroit, said there is no truth to the rumors that E&L Supermercado has been singled out for surveillance.

But he said there are other places in southwest Detroit -- he wouldn't say where -- that are being watched for undocumented immigrants.

That is enough to fuel fears at E&L, which over the past 20 years has shifted its focus from primarily serving Eastern Europeans to meeting the tastes and needs of the growing Spanish-speaking communities in southwest Detroit.

Piñatas hang from its ceilings, and cashiers speak to customers in English and Spanish. The store stocks everything from Mexican apple soda to 15 different kinds of canned jalapeños.

"They just think, wherever there is a lot of Mexican people -- don't go there," said Rosalva Orozco, 27, a cashier at the supermarket, referring to local Latinos. "We're worried."

If you're breaking the law you should be worried and yes you are a bad person who is doing something wrong if you are here illegally...Just hope that these rumors don't make them feel bolder once they pass over