Tyson Acquitted
Tyson Acquitted
Date: Monday, March 31, 2003 12:30 PM
H-1B and JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER
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Experts on immigration law said a conviction could have raised the bar
for employers to bear greater responsibility for the legal status of
their workers. Since Tyson was let off the hook without a conviction,
the bar has been lowered to such a low level it's doubtful anything
meaningful can be done to stop employers from hiring illegal aliens.
In the case of Tyson, even managers admitted that Tyson used loopholes
to hire illegal aliens. As further proof, an undercover agent who posed
as a smuggler testified that he delivered illegal immigrants directly
to the manager of a Tyson Foods poultry plant to use as cheap labor.
Prosecutors in the federal conspiracy trial played secretly recorded
tapes of a the manager when he said he needed hundreds more workers.
The reason managers gave for Tyson's hiring of illegal aliens was quite
simple. Their pay was so low and the work conditions so bad that only
illegal aliens would do the work. Apparently that was an acceptable
excuse for the jury.
http://money.cnn.com/2003/03/26/news/companies/tyson.reut/index.htm
Tyson acquitted in smuggling case
Federal prosecutors had accused the poultry processor of conspiracy to
violate immigration laws.
March 26, 2003: 4:34 PM EST
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (Reuters) - A federal court jury Wednesday acquitted
Tyson Foods and three of its executives of conspiring to smuggle
illegal immigrants to work at its poultry plants.
Government prosecutors had accused Tyson (TSN: Research, Estimates),
the leading U.S. poultry processor, with conspiracy to violate
immigration laws, fraud, and obstruction of justice.
Experts on immigration law said a conviction could have raised the bar
for employers to bear greater responsibility for the legal status of
their workers
http://www.tennessean.com/local/archives/03/03/30069449.shtml?Element_ID=30069449
Manager says Tyson used loopholes to hire illegally
By LEON ALLIGOOD
Staff Writer
CHATTANOOGA - For 35 years, Truley Ponder has been Tyson Foods' man in
Shelbyville, Tenn., a loyal employee of the giant chicken-processing
firm.
But yesterday he testified against Tyson and three of its mid-level
managers before a federal jury hearing evidence in the conspiracy trial
against the company.
The defendants are charged with conspiring to smuggle 170 undocumented
Hispanics in 26 loads to seven Tyson plants and recruiting workers for
10 other Tyson plants nationwide. They also are charged with providing
workers with false documentation.
''Did I know they were illegal? I knew they were, part of them,'' said
Ponder, who also was charged in the case but pleaded guilty in January
and has agreed to help the prosecution.
During four hours of direct examination yesterday by Assistant U.S.
Attorney Guy Blackwell, the basis of Ponder's testimony was that he, as
plant manager, was between the proverbial rock and a hard place on many
issues.
To meet production quotas for processing 1.3 million chickens per week,
the plant needed a full staff of about 1,100 workers, but efforts to
recruit local workers had been fruitless, he said.
''Our pay was low. If we were going to hire local people, particularly
away from the pencil factories, we needed substantial pay increases,''
Ponder testified. (Shelbyville has long been called the ''pencil
capital of the world'' for the many pencil factories there
historically.)
But requests he made for substantial increases in the $7.15 per hour
starting pay were never OK'd by his superiors, Ponder added.
Using Hispanics proved viable and profitable.
''By 1997, the number of Hispanics working for us was increased
substantially, maybe 50%. The night shift was 70% Hispanic,'' Ponder
said.
''We met our production numbers and were fully staffed. Shelbyville
became a good complex.''
Depending on so many undocumented workers proved problematic, however.
There was constant turnover, meaning replacements were always needed,
and there were a succession of obstacles that made covert hiring of
undocumented workers more and more difficult.
Ponder said it was easier at first to bring in undocumented workers
without raising red flags to the Immigration and Naturalization
Service.
Under a plan called the ''Employee Verification Program,'' Ponder said
Tyson plants took advantage of a loophole to put undocumented workers
on the payroll.
The EVP was replaced by a much more reliable identity-checking program
called ''Basic Pilot,'' which was designed for the poultry industry by
the INS.
''Did Basic Pilot concern you?'' Blackwell asked.
''It would have been a major problem for Shelbyville, because we
couldn't hire the Hispanics,'' Ponder replied.
The former manager said he was told by his superiors to ignore Basic
Pilot as long as he could.
Ponder said he thought the answer to his staffing problem had been
supplied when he had meetings in 1997 with a Shelbyville man, Amador
Anchondo-Rascon, and Benito Maldonado, who unknown to either of the
other two men was an undercover agent for the U.S. Border Patrol.
In exchange for $200 per worker, the men were to supply recruits and
false documentation for them.
''That way they could pass Basic Pilot and be on the payroll,'' Ponder
said.
Unknown to him at the time, all of his conversations with Maldonado
were recorded.
The trial continues today before U.S. District Judge R. Allan Edgar.
If found guilty, Tyson could face fines of $100 million. The managers,
Robert Hash, Gerald Lankford and Keith Snyder, face years in a federal
prison.
http://www.clarionledger.com/news/0303/30/b02.html
March 30, 2003
Experts: More immigration prosecution due
Tyson acquittal won't halt illegal worker crackdown
By Bill Poovey
The Associated Press
CHATTANOOGA - Tyson Foods' acquittal Wednesday on charges of conspiring
to hire illegal immigrants dealt a setback to the government's strategy
of enforcing immigration laws by going after big business.
That doesn't mean major employers of unskilled workers should rest
easy.
With more than 7 million illegal immigrants in the United States most
lured here by job opportunities the temptation for abuse still exists.
Immigration law experts predict more such prosecutions in the future.
"Is there going to be another target? Absolutely," said Matthew
Yarbrough, a Dallas lawyer who last year successfully defended a Tyson
personnel employee in a similar case.
But experts say any other case will face the same obstacle hit by the
Tyson prosecutors the vast gray area in the law that requires companies
to make a "good-faith effort" to determine if workers they've hired are
legal.
Tyson attorneys successfully argued that if the company hired illegal
workers, it was because of the huge underground market for phony
immigration papers and the government's flawed system of screening
immigrants.
Company attorneys show-ed jurors copies of Justice Department Civil
Rights Division brochures, including one titled "Look at the Facts, Not
at the Faces," with warnings about discrimination based on appearance.
The brochures advise employers to accept worker documents "as long as
they appear to be reasonably genuine."
"This is the dilemma. Did they make the good-faith effort or not?" said
Bill Strassberger, U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement
spokesman.
Prosecutors relied on undercover agents who posed as smugglers and
transporters of immigrants. They testified they delivered 136 illegal
immigrants from Mexico and Central America for Tyson employment.
Prosecutors charged that top executives at Tyson's Springdale, Ark.,
headquarters also knew about illegal hirings, but jurors who
deliberated for seven hours were not convinced.
http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGASDFX0VBD.html
Feb 6, 2003
Border Agent Testifies He Delivered Illegal Immigrants
Directly to Tyson Manager
By Bill Poovey
Associated Press Writer
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (AP) - An undercover agent who posed as a smuggler
testified Thursday that he delivered illegal
immigrants directly to the manager of a Tyson Foods poultry plant to
use as cheap labor. Prosecutors in the federal conspiracy trial also
played secretly recorded tapes on which a man - whom they identified as
the manager - says he needs hundreds more workers.
"Hell, I put over 700 people to work," the man said. "I'm going to need
to replace 300 or 400 people - maybe 500. I'm
going to need a lot."
The company and three officials are charged with conspiring to smuggle
illegal immigrants to work on the production lines
of the nation's largest meat processor.
Tyson lawyers said in Wednesday's opening statements that any hiring of
illegal immigrants was done by a few plant managers
and was not known to executives at Tyson headquarters in Springdale,
Ark.
"No one in senior management knew," attorney Tom Green said. "No member
of senior management ever violated immigration laws or encouraged"
anyone else to do so.
Border Patrol Agent Benito Maldonado testified that he handed over
eight illegal immigrants to Monroe, N.C., plant manager
Robert Sanford in January 1998. Court records have identified Sanford
as an unindicted coconspirator in the case.
Maldonado, who was known to Tyson as Benjamin, described picking up
eight illegal immigrants at a warehouse near where
they snuck into the country in Del Rio, Texas, using brush as cover.
On the secret tapes, the man identified as Sanford says he would have
to check with his boss about paying for the eight
workers.
Maldonado testified Wednesday that Tyson plants solicited and accepted
26 deliveries of illegal immigrant workers during an
undercover investigation started in 1997.
He said a total of 136 illegal immigrants were taken to Tyson plants in
six states. Another 18 illegals were intercepted
before reaching Cumming, Ga.
Defense attorneys had yet to question Maldonado.
Prosecutors say the conspiracy began in 1994 after Tyson plant managers
had trouble hiring cheap legal help for its poultry plants. Company
officials then turned to a pipeline of illegal immigrants from Mexico
and Central America, Assistant U.S. Attorney John MacCoon alleged.
"This trial is about corporate greed," MacCoon told jurors Wednesday.
MacCoon said Tyson sought illegal immigrants because they "would work
for low wages and never complain - no matter how much they were
exploited."
Tyson attorneys said they turned down a government demand for $100
million to have the charges dismissed. They also have
accused the government of using undercover agents to entrap Tyson
employees.
A December 2001 indictment accuses Tyson and three company officials of
taking part in a smuggling conspiracy. Besides the company, the
defendants include Gerald Lankford, 63, of North Wilkesboro, N.C., a
former human relations manager; and
two Tyson executives on administrative leave, Robert Hash, 49, of
Greenwood, Ark., and Keith Snyder, 42, of Bella Vista,
Ark.
Attorneys for Lankford, Hash and Snyder told jurors their clients took
part in no conspiracies and never knowingly hired illegal workers.
If found guilty, Tyson could face millions in fines and the loss of
government contracts. The company supplies roughly
one-quarter of the nation's chicken.
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