January 31, 2006

Lawyers: make big money suing illegal alien employers!

Zirkle Fruit is an apple producer in eastern Washington, and they recently settled a lawsuit brought by former legal workers. Those workers alleged that Zirkle hired illegal aliens in order to drive down their wages. The settlement amount was $1.3 million. Not exactly a large amount, but the lawyers involved will probably get a good part of that and there's much more where that came from.

...Lawyers now begin the task of locating and notifying Zirkle employees eligible for an undetermined share of the settlement funds.

Eligible workers would be those who have legal work documents or are U.S. citizens and were employed during the class period beginning Nov. 5, 1999, through Sept. 8, 2004.

Volk told the judge he was not certain how much money eligible workers might receive. But he said it would be based on hours worked during the class period and likely would be less than $2 an hour...

There's background on the case in "RICO: A New Tool for Immigration Law Enforcement":

Olivia Mendoza is an agricultural worker in Washington state's fruit industry, and, while the fruit business in Washington is a billion-dollar-per-year industry, she and many of her co-workers live in poverty. Part of their poverty is due to the fact that some employers, like Ms. Mendoza's, lower industry wages by illegally hiring low-skill foreign nationals without proper work authorization.

Not only do these illegal aliens work for less than US citizens and legal workers, like Ms. Mendoza, they also accept inferior and even unsafe working conditions. Aside from perpetuating poverty among illegal aliens themselves, the hiring of illegal aliens also suppresses wages and worsens working conditions for legal employees like Olivia Mendoza. Fortunately for her and thousands of Americans in similar circumstances, there is recourse...

Posted to Immigration at January 31, 2006 01:35 PM

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