Thread: Supervisors at raided meatpacking plant arrested

Supervisors at raided meatpacking plant arrested





Associated Press - July 3, 2008 3:24 PM ET

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - Two supervisors at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville that was raided by federal immigration agents in May have been arrested.

Juan Carlos Guerrero-Espinoza and Martin De La Rosa-Loera are charged in criminal complaints unsealed Thursday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Iowa.

They face charges of encouraging illegal immigrants to reside in the U.S. and aiding and abetting the possession and use of fraudulent identification. Guerrero-Espinoza also is charged with aiding and abetting aggravated identity theft.

Federal immigration officials raided the Agriprocessors Inc. plant in the small northeast Iowa town on May 12. Nearly 400 workers were detained.

According to the complaints, unnamed witnesses told federal officials that Guerrero-Espinoza and De La Rosa-Loera were supervisors at the plant, the nation's largest kosher meatpacking plant.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.



http://www.whotv.com/global/story.asp?s=8617114

Great news

Fantastic news!

Agriprocessor is the largest processor of kosher meats in the country, and its owners are Russian. Somehow these do not seem like applicable last names. One can only hope they are "working their way to the top" with these arrests. The only ones arrested above "worker level" in ICE raids on U.S. meatpacking plants so far all have had Spanish surnames, and the supervisors arrested at another plant all were illegal aliens themselves. Let's hope for further good news.

And it has just has been posted in "Defendents in ICE Raid Appear in Court (with Video)" (News Stories). The "Houston Chronicle" reports that the "owner and two employees of Action Rags USA have posted bond" after being arrested in the ICE raid which also detained some 70 women working there illegally. The owner is given as Mabarik Kahlon.

I may be ignorant, but I thought kosher was a means to kill animals. How could you have a meat packing plant and be assured of that when you mix it with other means? This was a ritual.....not word of mouth. Wonder how many Kosher people have been eating none kosher foods out of ignorance and paid 2wice as much for it? Trusting and believing these people were abiding by a law, relegious or otherwise?


LOL...your Hebrew Brand National was nothing more than that, mixed with Ball Park and BarS!!!!!! And you spent a fortune for it!!!!!! LOL Hey.....but no big deal......or is it?

Two supervisors arrested at Iowa kosher plant
By JULIA PRESTON, New York Times
July 3, 2008

Two supervisors at a kosher meatpacking plant in Iowa where hundreds of illegal immigrants were rounded up in May were arrested Thursday on criminal immigration charges.

Federal prosecutors said they had also issued an arrest warrant for a third man described by workers as one of the plant's managers.

The supervisors, Juan Carlos Guerrero Espinoza and Martin De la Rosa Loera, were arrested at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville, prosecutors said.

They were the first employees who were not rank-and-file workers to be arrested since 389 illegal immigrants were rounded up at the plant on May 12, said Bob Teig, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Iowa.

Federal authorities called the raid the largest enforcement operation by immigration authorities at a single workplace.

Unions and immigrant advocacy groups had criticized immigration officials for focusing arrests on workers while taking no action against top managers.

The arrest warrant was issued for Hosam Amara, 43.

In interviews after the raid, several workers said that Amara was a floor manager with more authority than line supervisors and that he was a link between workers on the slaughterhouse floors and meatpacking lines and more-senior management.

Agriprocessors, which before the raid was the country's largest producer of kosher meat, is owned by Aaron Rubashkin.

Two weeks after the raid, he removed his son Sholom as chief executive.

Most of the illegal immigrants arrested at the plant were from rural Guatemala. In expedited proceedings, 270 workers were sent to federal prison on criminal charges, most for presenting false documents when they were hired.

In a criminal complaint unsealed on Thursday, federal authorities said Guerrero was the supervisor of four departments in the Postville plant, including a slaughterhouse called Beef Kill.

Workers cited anonymously in the complaint said Guerrero was running a business obtaining fraudulent immigration documents, known as green cards.

In the days before the raid, the workers said, according to the complaint, Guerrero told them in a meeting that "they needed new IDs and Social Security numbers to continue working at the company." Guerrero collected $200 and a photograph from each worker, promising to provide new documents, the complaint says.

A separate complaint says De la Rosa, a supervisor in Poultry Kill, also told illegal immigrant workers shortly before the raid that they needed new identity documents.

The complaints make it clear that a grand jury investigation of Agriprocessors is continuing.

Union officials said the new arrests did not go far enough. "The arrest of two low-level supervisors, while a start, barely scratches the surface of this company's bad behavior," said Scott Frotman, a spokesman for the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which has tried to organize the plant.
http://www.startribune.com/nation/22934 ... tModules:1

So 2 of the 400 illegals they busted happened to be supervisors - big whoop.

Two supervisors arrested at Postville plant
By GRANT SCHULTE • gschulte@dmreg.com • July 3, 2008

Federal authorities arrested two plant supervisors at the Postvillle-based Agriprocessors, Inc. this morning for allegedly helping many undocumented employees work at the kosher meatpacking plant illegally, according to a federal complaint unsealed today.

Immigration agents arrested Martin De La Rosa-Loera and Juan Carlos Guerrero-Espinoza and were driving them down to Cedar Rapids for court hearings, said U.S. Attorney spokesman Bob Teig. Authorities also are searching for a third worker, Teig said, who will be identified later this afternoon.


The complaint also alleges that several of the illegal workers traveled to Des Moines in April to obtain false identification papers.

De La Rosa-Loera and Guerrero-Espinoza work as plant supervisors, according to the complaint. Both were charged with aiding and abetting the use of fraudulent identification documents. De La Rosa-Loera oversees four areas of the plant, including the poultry kill department; Guerra-Espinoza supervises four areas including the beef kill department.

The arrests come more more than a month after federal agents stormed the plant and detained 389 immigrant workers in the largest single-site immigration raid in American history. A federal affidavit released after the May 12 raid suggested that plant managers had abused workers and knew that much of the plant’s work force was undocumented.

According to the complaint:

The charges stem from the testimony of several illegal workers, including one — identified in court papers as “Source 3â€

Article published: Jul 4, 2008
Two supervisors charged with luring illegal immigrants

CEDAR RAPIDS Two supervisors at the Agriprocessors kosher meatpacking plant in Postville on Thursday became the first known members of the company's management to be arrested after a federal immigration raid of the company in May.

A federal arrest warrant has been issued for another Agriprocessors employee whose whereabouts are unknown.

Juan Carlos Guerrero-Espinoza, 35, and Martin De La Rosa-Loera, 43, are accused of encouraging illegal immigrants to work at the plant, in some cases even helping them obtain false documents before the raid.

The two men were arrested at Agriprocessors on Thursday morning by U.S. marshals and were held on a U.S. Department of Homeland Security bus in the parking lot behind the temporary federal courthouse at 4200 C St. SW, Cedar Rapids, before their initial court appearances Thursday afternoon.

De La Rosa-Loera oversees the plant's poultry kill facility, and Guerrero-Espinoza is in charge of the beef kill, according to court records. Guerrero-Espinoza is a U.S. citizen, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Pete Deegan Jr. He did not reveal De La Rosa-Loera's citizenship status.

The charges are related to the May 12 Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid at Agriprocessors that detained 389 workers, most of them Guatemalan and Mexican, for immigration violations. Of those, 300 were convicted and deported.

The supervisors were indicted by a federal grand jury after a former human resources employee and illegal immigrants at Agriprocessors testified last month, according to court records. They told investigators of an effort by the men to update employee documents in the weeks before the raid.

The week before the raid, Guerrero-Espinoza told some of his employees to give him $200 for new documentation to continue working at the company, court records state. Some of the workers testified that he asked them for an extra $20 to cover the cost of gasoline or serve as his commission. On the day before the raid, the workers were provided new application packets complete with fake resident alien cards to sign and return.

Employees were aware that "company officials were concerned about ICE agents in Waterloo," the complaints state.

Information about ICE renting buildings at the National Cattle Congress in Waterloo came out in early May, but the agency would not reveal why it was in Waterloo. After the raid, the Cattle Congress grounds were used to house detained workers and process them through initial court appearances.

Both men face up to 20 years in prison if convicted of the charges. Guerrero-Espinoza is facing an additional charge of aiding and abetting aggravated identity theft, which could get him another sentence of up to 15 years.

ICE officials are seeking the public's help in locating Hosam Amara, 43, last known to live in Postville. The criminal complaint against him has been sealed until his arrest. Anyone with information is asked to call ICE at 1-(88 347-2423.

Agriprocessors officials did not return messages for comment Thursday. Federal prosecutors did not say whether more members of management would face charges.

Guerrero-Espinoza and De La Rosa-Loera will be held at the Cedar County Jail until their detention hearings Monday. They will be arraigned July 17.

www.gazetteonline.com

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