More than 40 charged in federal court from Mississippi ICE raid, but no company officials

https://news.yahoo.com/more-40-charged-federal-court-185824240.html

Jimmie E. Gates and Luke Ramseth
,USA TODAY•August 17, 2019

Charges have been filed in federal court accusing more than 40 people detained in the recent Mississippi chicken processing plant raids of being in the United States illegally.

But more than a week after the raids, there are no records of company officials charged with knowingly hiring undocumented workers. This is despite information in federal search warrant affidavits suggesting company officials knew their workers were undocumented.

Some managers knew workers wore ankle monitors to work as they waited on immigration hearings, the warrants say. One of the chicken companies was aware its workers used fraudulent Social Security numbers, a confidential informant told investigators. A human resources employee revealed an employee was hired on two occasions, under two different identities.

When a Guatemalan man encountered law enforcement in Texas, he admitted he had worked at one of the plants, Koch Foods, and reportedly said the plant knew about his immigration status and that there were “a lot of illegals working there."

•••••

The search warrant affidavits suggest all five companies that operated the processing plants knowingly hired undocumented immigrants. Companies engaging in a “pattern and practice” of knowingly hiring undocumented immigrants can be fined as much as $3,000 for each person hired. Company officials can face up to six months in prison.

•••••

In addition, investigators found some employees had not been run through the legally-required federal E-Verify system, which scans an applicant's information through federal databases. (The system can't necessarily flag whether an applicant is using fake documents, however.)

Agents also said they learned some employees entering and leaving the plants did not match up with names of employees in the company's quarterly wage report filed with the state.

•••••

Legal experts said there have been relatively few prosecutions of employers over hiring of undocumented workers over the years.

Under President Donald Trump, ICE has drastically increased immigration crackdowns including worksite enforcement actions, according to the Associated Press. But the amount of employers being charged has remained almost the same.

There are a few prominent recent examples from Mississippi, however.

•••••