Thread: Really nervous now......

Ok, I was leaving for work this morning and I was pulling out of my driveway, (I live in a townhouse community) and some men were doing work on the roof on the building across from my house. I watched for a minute and the guys started pointing and laughing at me. Well, this piqued my interest. So I got out of my car and walked over there. And of course the men on the roof were speaking spanish and I asked the white guy on the ground if this was his buisness, he said it was not, and gave me the name of the company.

So, here is where it starts to get interesting. I call my home owners association and speak with a woman there, I explain to her that I am concerned that this company is hiring illegal immigrants and that I do not want the fees I pay to go to paying any company that hires illegal immigrants. And I do threaten to call immigration enforcement, unless I am satisfied that the workers are legaly allowed to work in the U.S

She, the lady seems concerned, almost scared. She advises me that she will call the owner of the company and find out what is going on, she ask for my number which I give her. 5 minutes later the owner of the company calls me and right from get go starts CUSSING ME OUT, and THREATING TO "GET ME" if I don't mind my buisness.

Well, as you can imagine, I am a bit of an angry person myself and started to cuss this guy back, I challenged him about his patriotism, ect, ect. He hangs up on me.

I call the Homeowners association back and explain to the lady what happened and explained that I did not give her my number to have this crazy man call me and threaten me. She advised that she would call me back after talking with him. Well, 5 minutes later, this guys WIFE calls me and starts to apologize to me, and explained to me that all the workers are legal and that one had a bad SS and they fired him, she did confirm they were ALL Mexicans that worked for her company. She invited me to come by next tuesday to prove that the workers were legal. I accepted.

Then, 10 min later the owner calls me back, and he is being nice now. Apologizing and then tried to explain to me that he cannot find American workers, AND that Mexicans work harder, and better then American workers. I had just got to work and could not really explain to him how I felt about what he said. Several times during that last conversation he eluded to me that workers were in fact illegal.

Anyhow, my concern is this, those men saw what house I live in, my wife is 28 weeks pregnant and I work 45 miles away. I am scared to death for her saftey. Did I screw up? God I hope not..... I will hurt someone badly if they mess with my wife and baby... I swear, it will be bad......Me and my frigging big mouth... I swear.....

Unfortunately, this is how they typically terrorize whoever is against them.

1. I would call the management of the townhouse community and tell them because of their stupidity in giving out your phone number, you were threatened by the "businessman" and they have put you and your family in a dangerous situation.

2. Call the police and file a report, make sure they are aware of the threat.

3. Call ICE.

I called the police, they asked if he made a specific threat. I told the truth, no he just said that he would get me.

Second, the homeowners association could make my life hell.

Third, will ICE do anything?

Tell the police you want it on the record in case something does happen. Good idea to put hidden video cameras on your house to record anything they will do.

If something does happen (vandalism, etc.), you might be able to sue the homeowners association for violating your civil rights.

Doesn't hurt to call ICE.

This is one of the reasons that reporting should be done discreetly and keeping a low a profile as possible.

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer and am not qualified to lend legal or similar advice - following or not, at your own initiative:

Having said that, at this point Ronster has 2 basic options: holding back and stepping away, vs going forward and intensifying the report.

I think I tend to agree with Miguelina at this point. You have an admission from the owner of the company of previous problems, so technically, you're justified in reporting to ICE. Having said that, unless ICE investigates/finds problems/detains the same people - involved you don't have any assurance that those same people will be off the street. So, you still have to be very careful. Actually, given the threat and that the threat came as a result of the property manager's communication (eg. negligence), you could argue that they are responsible for your safety in the meantime - until the thing settles down. If you do report to ICE, I'd also relay all the information you've outlaid here, and see what they can suggest or help somehow...

...Just my 0.02 cents....


Edit/Update: Given the business owner's strong reaction and denial of hiring IAs, and then sort of contradicting himself (not to mention the threat to yourself about all this...), ICE may want to pursue the situation with a higher priority than usual; being that the safety and well-being of someone hangs in the balance. If so, a quick raid might find IAs in the company as well as deal with the owner ASAP (that would probably be the best outcome possible).

You may want to call him back and tell him you will take him at his word
and you don't need to come to his office etc.

After this dies down report the sob

The welfare of your wife and child come first

sometime we have to pick our fights your efforts on Alipac alone are more then most Americans do to rid us of the job stealing invaders so I say relax call a truce on that battlefront plenty of fronts to fight on.

I like jim's advice, he gets my vote.

You have to follow through. Make formal complaints and make sure the homeowners association have copies of those. They will know then that if they harrasse you or if something happens { God Forbid} they will be suspect. I hope that it was your cell that you spoke on because then you will have the times and the phone numbers listed on your cell phone statement. You should contact ICE but do so, in a way that you have a paper trail.

My fear is if you do nothing at all, and they perceive you as a threat you have nothing concrete to go back on. They can then just say you were a problem. And you wont have anything to document what transpired.

Good idea to put hidden video cameras on your house to record anything they will do.

There is a camera company with a program and cameras you can buy, it's got 10 in the name??? I can't remember the name but I bought $200 worth of it and now I would assume it is wireless. It has voice activated cameras and low-light camera's, color or B/W.
The program makes it so YOU can watch your house at work or where ever. Later, you can watch the baby!
Good for you though, you did what any decent American SHOULD do. I'm like you, I've had death threats from turning in abuse /homicide of 2 mentally retarded clients that were my group at my job. I'm a girl and live alone, I bought a gun and went on stress meds.... it's hard. I got Workman's Comp for 7 months.... I set a precedent in Maine. Evidently only cops get it from job stress. I worked in an institution for 25 years.

Originally Posted by jimpasz

You may want to call him back and tell him you will take him at his word
and you don't need to come to his office etc.

After this dies down report the sob

The welfare of your wife and child come first

sometime we have to pick our fights your efforts on Alipac alone are more then most Americans do to rid us of the job stealing invaders so I say relax call a truce on that battlefront plenty of fronts to fight on.

Good points, jimpasz. Ronster, when you call him, you might want to tell him if something happens to your property, HE will be held liable.

I do want to strongly URGE you to get the video equipment installed immediately tho.

I have found if you back down, they WILL consider you to be fair game and will vandalize your property. They would vandalize it either way, to leave you a "message". You want that message on video.

After it dies down and he forgets about you, report him.