U.S. immigration raids Ohio chicken plant

U.S. immigration raids Ohio chicken plant
Tue Aug 28, 2007 1:06PM EDT

CINCINNATI (Reuters) - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said it raided the Koch Foods Inc. chicken plant in Fairfield, Ohio, on Tuesday as part of a criminal operation against illegal immigrants employed at the plant.

"This was a targeted work site enforcement operation involving criminal search warrants," said ICE spokesman Greg Palmore. "We executed at 10 o'clock (EDT) this morning."

He declined to say how many employees had been detained, and said the operation was continuing.

Calls to Koch Foods were unanswered.

http://www.reuters.com/article/domestic ... 5020070828

"CINCINNATI - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement expects to arrest 'more than 100' people in a raid on a Koch Foods Inc. chicken plant in Ohio on Tuesday, and the company's Chicago headquarters has also been served with search warrants.

'We're anticipating more than 100 (arrests) but the numbers have not been confirmed,' ICE spokesman Greg Palmore said. 'Simultaneous search warrants were executed at Koch Foods in Cincinnati and at the Koch headquarters in Chicago.'

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Immigration raids Ohio chicken plant
Tue Aug 28, 2007 1:45PM EDT
By Andrea Hopkins

CINCINNATI (Reuters) - U.S. immigration officials raided the Koch Foods Inc. chicken plant in Fairfield, Ohio, and expect to arrest more than 100 employees as part of a criminal operation against illegal immigrants, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said on Tuesday.

"We're anticipating more than 100 (arrests) but the numbers have not been confirmed," said ICE spokesman Greg Palmore. "Simultaneous search warrants were executed at Koch Foods in Cincinnati and at the Koch headquarters in Chicago."

"This was a targeted work site enforcement operation involving criminal search warrants," Palmore said.

Palmore said the raid, which began at 10 a.m. EDT, was the culmination of a two-year investigation of Koch Foods, which produces chicken for export, food service and retail markets.

Calls to Koch Foods, headquartered in the Chicago suburb of Park Ridge, Illinois, were unanswered.

Tim Bachman, development services director for the city of Fairfield, said the plant near Cincinnati employs about 500 workers.

The raid on Koch was the latest in a series of immigration raids targeting businesses employing illegal workers across the United States. Many U.S. meat industry workers are immigrants, mainly Hispanics.

In December 2006, hundreds of employees were detained in raids at Swift & Co. meat plants in six states, part of a probe into identity theft involving illegal immigrants.

Deputies in the Butler County, Ohio sheriff's office were assisting federal immigration agents with the Koch raid and may provide detention facilities if required, a sheriff's office spokesman said.

Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones has been one of the country's most outspoken opponent of illegal immigration and has lobbied Washington for better enforcement and deportation of undocumented workers.

But immigration advocates in Cincinnati said the force used during the raids was terrifying the local community, including U.S.-born children of immigrants who are afraid their parents will be taken away.

"I got a call from one woman this morning and her husband was just picked up at the chicken processing plant," said Shelly Jarrett Bromberg, director of the Butler County Community Alliance.

"(Immigration agents) believe that in picking up a few people here, if done with enough force, will send back others through fear. The children don't understand and are now going home and asking if they're going to be arrested," she said.

"It impacts the entire community in a negative way. The law gives them the right to do this, but we think it could be more humanely done."

(Additional reporting by Bob Burgdorfer in Chicago)


© Reuters 2006. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.

Reuters journalists are subject to the Reuters Editorial Handbook which requires fair presentation and disclosure of relevant interests.

http://www.reuters.com/article/domestic ... 5020070828

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Originally Posted by controlledImmigration

"CINCINNATI - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement expects to arrest 'more than 100' people in a raid on a Koch Foods Inc. chicken plant in Ohio on Tuesday, and the company's Chicago headquarters has also been served with search warrants.

'We're anticipating more than 100 (arrests) but the numbers have not been confirmed,' ICE spokesman Greg Palmore said. 'Simultaneous search warrants were executed at Koch Foods in Cincinnati and at the Koch headquarters in Chicago.'

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I love to hear that ICE is hitting places in "Santuary Cities" like Chicago. That sends a message loud and clear that they will go ANYWHERE and that the illegals are NOT necessarily "safe" in these cities.

Hey MIC~another good thing for you to look at!! :wink: :D

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"It impacts the entire community in a negative way. The law gives them the right to do this, but we think it could be more humanely done."

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If this isn't humane enough they could always leave on their own! :D

By Andrea Hopkins
51 minutes ago

CINCINNATI (Reuters) - More than 300 U.S. immigration agents raided the Koch Foods Inc. chicken plant in Fairfield, Ohio, and arrested more than 160 employees as part of a criminal operation against illegal immigrants, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said on Tuesday.

"As of 2:45 p.m. (EDT) more than 180 Koch employees have been identified for further questioning and more than 160 have been administratively arrested for immigration violations," ICE special agent in charge Brian Moskowitz told a news conference in Cincinnati.

ICE said in a statement the raid was "part of a two-year, ongoing ICE investigation based on evidence that Koch Foods may have knowingly hired illegal aliens at its poultry processing and packaging facility."

The raid at Koch Foods, which produces chicken for export, food service and retail markets, began at 10 a.m. EDT. Moskowitz said simultaneous search warrants were executed at the plant near Cincinnati and Koch's Chicago headquarters.

Calls to Koch Foods, based in the Chicago suburb of Park Ridge, Illinois, were unanswered. Koch Foods is not affiliated with Wichita, Kansas,-based Koch Industries, the largest private company in the United States, a spokeswoman for Koch Industries said.

Tim Bachman, development services director for the city of Fairfield, said the plant employs about 500 workers.

The raid was the latest targeting businesses employing illegal workers across the United States. In December 2006, hundreds of employees were detained in raids at Swift & Co. meat plants in six states, part of a probe into identity theft involving illegal immigrants.

Many U.S. meat industry workers are immigrants, mainly Hispanics.

Moskowitz said employees faced a range of charges including illegal reentry to the United States, identity theft, document fraud, social security fraud and forgery. Koch Foods was being investigated for federal crimes including encouraging, inducing or harboring illegal aliens.

Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones has been one of the country's most outspoken opponents of illegal immigrants and employers who use them, and has lobbied Washington for better enforcement and deportation of undocumented workers.

"I've been saying for 2-1/2 years 'We're coming, ... don't hire illegals, don't violate the law,"' Jones told the news conference. "I personally have no sympathy for you whatsoever, None. Zero." :D Go Sheriff Jones!

A handful of protesters shouting "this is an outrage" tried to disrupt the news conference.

"These are working people, these are family people, they are keeping our economy growing. They should not be arrested. What's happening to their children?" said Dan LaBotz, carrying a sign reading "Stop the attack on immigrant families."

Immigration advocates in Cincinnati said the force used during the raids was terrifying the local community, including U.S.-born children who fear their immigrant parents will be taken away.

"I got a call from one woman this morning and her husband was just picked up at the chicken processing plant," said Shelly Jarrett Bromberg, director of the Butler County Community Alliance.

She said officials believe raids "will send back others through fear. The children don't understand and are now going home and asking if they're going to be arrested."

ICE said those who had been detained would be taken to a processing facility in the Cincinnati area and procedures to remove them from the United States would begin. But it noted that some may be released for humanitarian reasons -- for example, the sole caregiver to children.

(Additional reporting by Bob Burgdorfer in Chicago)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070828/ts_ ... whlCcE1vAI

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But it noted that some may be released for humanitarian reasons -- for example, the sole caregiver to children.

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So does this mean we have to now release every "sole caregiver to children" in our state and federal prisons? I didn't think so! :roll:

I AM SO SICK OF HEARING THE WHINING. "OH THE FAMILY" "OH THE CHILDREN" "JUST TRYING TO GET A BETTER LIFE".

WHEN THEY CROSSED THE BORDER ILLEGALLY THEY BECAME SCAB LABOR UNDERMINING THE JOB STABILITY OF THE AMERICAN WORKER. WHAT ABOUT THE FAMILIES OF THE AMERICAN WORKER? THE CHILDREN OF THE AMERICAN WORKER? THE LIVING STANDARDS OF THE AMERICAN WORKER?

WE ARE JUST ENFORCING THE LAW. THERE ARE MANY OTHER COUNTRIES TO GO TO IF THEY DONT LIKE THE ENVIRONMENT HERE IN THE USA. OR THEY CAN GO HOME. THE DOOR IS IN THE SAME PLACE IT WAS WHEN THEY CAME IN.

U.S. immigrants worry as families face deportation

By Andrea Hopkins Aug 29, 2007, 14:20 GMT



FAIRFIELD, Ohio - When 300 U.S. immigration agents surrounded the chicken processing plant where Danny Alvarez-Reyes works, he did the only thing he could think of: he gave his coat to a scared friend determined to hide in the walk-in freezer.

Alvarez-Reyes, 27, works legally at the Koch Food plant near Cincinnati and could only watch as co-workers were rounded up during a raid on Tuesday that netted 160 illegal workers.

But after an exhausting day trying to help his friends' families, Alvarez-Reyes was still worried about the five co-workers he watched hide in the giant freezer.

'I don't know if they ever got out, that's all I want to know,' he said, gathering with friends at a neighborhood taco restaurant to rehash the trauma of the day and trade rumors about who will be deported.

A day after one of the largest workplace immigration raids in Ohio, the Hispanic community in Cincinnati's suburbs was scrambling to track down missing family members and arrange care for children whose parents were caught up in the raid.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said the raid was the culmination of a two-year investigation of Koch Foods, suspected of knowingly hiring undocumented workers. The company said it was cooperating.

'Koch Foods is committed to complying with all immigration laws, and we look forward to resolving this matter quickly,' it said in a statement.

Illegal immigration is hotly debated in the United States, home to some 12 million illegal immigrants. A Zogby International poll in June found 46 percent of Americans believed illegal immigrants were a burden on the country, while 22 percent saw them as a benefit.

Still, only 37 percent viewed deportation as a solution, while about one in four said workers should be allowed to stay if they have jobs and pass background checks.

Last year, ICE agents deported 183,431 people amid stepped-up raids in workplaces and homes nationwide.

NO SYMPATHY

Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones, one of the country's most outspoken opponents of illegal immigration, has lobbied Washington to crack down on employers who hire illegal workers -- jobs he believes should go to Americans.

'I've been saying for two and a half years 'We're coming, ... don't hire illegals, don't violate the law,'' Jones said after the raid. 'I personally have no sympathy for you whatsoever. None. Zero.'

While rumors flew among Hispanics that some had been hurt or even frozen to death during the raid, ICE spokesman Greg Palmore said there were no significant injuries and that workers who hid in freezers had quickly been found.

A spokesman at Mercy Hospital in Fairfield said six people had been brought in with minor injuries including frostbite, and that all but one had been treated and released.

Palmore said everything possible had been done to ensure children would not be left unattended if parents had been arrested, and ICE officials said some workers may be released for humanitarian reasons if caregivers could not be found.

Still, many families said they'd been torn apart.

Guadalupe Santos, 40, said his eldest daughter, Rose Alba, 20, was swept up in the raid. He's been caring for her 6-month-old son, Christopher, ever since.

'We are frantic with worry,' said Santos, who came to the United States almost seven years ago from Mexico City with his wife and three daughters. 'We don't know where she's being held, or if we'll get access to her. We don't know if we should get a lawyer.'

Santos, who is a cook at a Chili's restaurant, said fear had gripped the Hispanic community.

'Everyone saw the raid on television, there is widespread fear, and now nobody wants to go out onto the street.'

Enrique Ventura, 20, is in a similar bind. He hasn't heard from his wife Angelica, 19, since she left for work at the Koch Food plant on Tuesday morning. The couple has a 4-month-old son.

'I stopped by her work to collect her and she wasn't there. Some people told me she'd been arrested by the immigration police and taken to the detention center,' he said.

Ventura was considering returning to Guatemala.

'I am devastated,' he said. 'If she is back in Guatemala, then I would have to go too, as I have no one to help raise him. The baby needs his mother.'

(Additional reporting by Tim Gaynor in Phoenix)

(c) Reuters 2007. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.

http://news.monstersandcritics.com/usa/ ... eportation

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A day after one of the largest workplace immigration raids in Ohio, the Hispanic community in Cincinnati's suburbs was scrambling to track down missing family members and arrange care for children whose parents were caught up in the raid.

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Come on down here ICE we have a bunch for ya!

Immigrants face charges

BY DAN HORN | DHORN@ENQUIRER.COM


Twenty of the 161 suspected illegal immigrants that federal agents detained after raiding a poultry packaging plant in Fairfield are in jail today on charges of falsifying identities.

The raid, among the largest of its kind in the country this year, is part of a two-year investigation into the hiring practices at Chicago-based Koch Foods Co.

Immigration officials described Koch Foods as an "egregious violator" of U.S. immigration laws, which means that the company is suspected of knowingly hiring undocumented workers.

Local and federal authorities said they would pursue criminal charges against company officials if they find evidence of fraud, falsification of documents or other crimes.

"We're going to look wherever the evidence takes us," said Brian Moskowitz, special agent in charge of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for Ohio and Michigan.

"No one gets a free pass."

Butler County Sheriff Rick Jones, an outspoken advocate for tougher immigration enforcement, said he hopes the raid sends a message to other employers.

"If you come to this county, you can't come here and commit a crime and go unscathed," he said.

'GOVERNMENT WON'T WORK WITH ME'

Workplace raids such as the one in Fairfield are on the rise across the country because U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has made them a priority, stirring debate about the fairness of immigration laws.

More than 3,600 suspected illegal aliens have been arrested nationwide in the past year, about three times as many as in 2005. The raid in Fairfield is the largest in Greater Cincinnati this year and one of the 20 largest nationwide.

More than 300 local and federal law-enforcement officers swept into the plant on Port Union Road about 10 a.m. Tuesday, sending several employees scrambling for the exits.

Moskowitz said some workers tried to hide in a subzero freezer and had to be rescued by ICE agents. He said a few were treated for hypothermia, but no one was seriously hurt.

Company officials in Chicago declined to comment, but a spokesman for the Fairfield plant said he has tried for several years to weed out undocumented workers. He said federal authorities have offered him no help.

"The government won't work with me," Monte Lobb, the spokesman, said.

He said the raid put such a dent in his work force of about 600 that the company could lose as much as $100,000 in chicken because no one was there to package it.

Lobb said the company does its best to determine whether the workers it hires are here legally.

"I'm against illegals," he said. "I'm not going to do anything to break the law, but people get false papers."

Authorities declined to comment on any conversations they might have had with Lobb or others at Koch about illegal workers. When asked about the company's claims, Moskowitz cited the number of arrests at the plant Tuesday.

"We identified 180 people for questioning, and 161 turned out to be illegal," he said. "I think those numbers speak for themselves."

'THESE RAIDS ARE AN OUTRAGE'

Advocates for immigrants said the raid was an arbitrary and unfair action that hurts immigrant families and does nothing to solve fundamental flaws in American immigration law.

"We're looking for them to be not so aggressive with workplace raids until we get a comprehensive reform bill passed," said Jason Riveiro, president of the League of United Latina American Citizens of Cincinnati.

"The problem persists," he said. "It's going to get larger and more difficult to solve."

About a dozen sign-toting protesters briefly interrupted federal officials Tuesday at the start of a news conference to discuss the raid.

"These raids are an outrage," said Dan LaBotz, a member of the Coalition for the Rights and Dignity of Immigrants. "These are working people. These are family people, and they're paying taxes."

Moskowitz tried to head off criticism by touting efforts to evaluate the workers detained Tuesday to determine whether they have family or children who rely on them for care. If they do, he said, they might be released pending deportation proceedings.

Butler County children's services officials also were at the plant to make sure no children were left without supervision because a parent or guardian was arrested. Officials said no children had been taken into the county's custody as of late Tuesday.

Koch Foods has processing and packaging centers in several states, including Georgia, Illinois and Alabama. According to Forbes magazine, the company was founded in 1973 and had revenues of $1.4 billion in 2005.

The magazine listed Koch last year as the 274th-largest private company in America.

Leigh Taylor contributed to this report


http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dl ... 6/-1/CINCI