Wal-Mart's lesson on immigration: This could be you

Kansas City Business Journal ^ | 11-18-03 | David Twiddy

[LibertySailor]

Wal-Mart's lesson on immigration: This could be you

David Twiddy Staff Writer

The immigration mess surrounding retail giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc. may be more than an excuse for competitors and critics to mutter about karma.

Local immigration and employment lawyers said the nation's largest private employer should act as a poster child for companies that rely on immigrant labor but don't maintain the proper paperwork showing that those employees are legal -- even if they work for a contractor.

"If it can happen to Wal-Mart, it can happen to other companies," said Marty Hereford, an immigration lawyer at Armstrong Teasdale LLP. "We've received a few calls from people who have contracted services out, and they don't believe some of the workers are legal. It's an interesting time."

Especially if you're with Wal-Mart.

Federal immigration officials raided the company's headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., and 60 of its stores last month, rounding up 250 janitors they determined were working without legal documentation.

The company also received a letter saying it could be the focus of a federal grand jury investigation. On Nov. 10, nine of the illegal workers filed a class-action suit, saying Wal-Mart swindled them out of overtime pay.

Wal-Mart has said that the employees worked for contractors and that officials didn't know the workers were illegal. It has not responded to the class-action suit.

Wal-Mart has a Harrisonville distribution center that employs 597 people, spokeswoman Sharon Weber said.

Weber said the company has strict procedures in place to ensure that third-party contractors always hire legal workers.

The company hasn't changed the way it documents third-party workers since the raid last month, she said, "but we're looking at what happened in those cases."

Attorneys acknowledged that much of the case against Wal-Mart rests on what proof immigration officials have that the company knew contractors were using undocumented workers.

Lawyers said companies should take lessons from the case, especially with the post-Sept. 11 immigration clampdown increasing the likelihood of raids. Likely targets include companies with large numbers of low-wage, unskilled jobs, such as manufacturing, agriculture and cleaning services.

They should make sure they have adequate proof that all employees are legal, said Mike Blumenthal, a lawyer at Constangy Brooks & Smith LLC.

"Unfortunately, it's an area where I don't get a call until after they've gotten a call from the INS," Blumenthal said.

Because the Wal-Mart case involved contractors, which don't usually turn over documentation to customers, lawyer Judy Bordeau of Eisberg & Bordeau suggested that companies check contracts to see whether they can either get verification that employees are legal or indemnification in the event they are proved otherwise.

Bordeau said companies can't cross the line between verifying that a worker is legal and singling him or her out.

"It's clear from reading the law how difficult it is for employers in that they can't discriminate against a worker for having a foreign-sounding name or an accent but then facing penalties if that person is found to be illegal," she said.

Bordeau and fellow immigration lawyer Mira Mdivani of Klamann & Hubbard PA in Overland Park said they hope the Wal-Mart case attracts attention to the growing backlash toward immigration and forces changes to the law, which has made their jobs much tougher in the past two years.

Mdivani said immigration raids like this in other parts of the country have resulted in the target's competitors and its legal employees suing the target for using illegal labor to force down wages and prices.

"I don't think it registers with the executives that the danger is there," Mdivani said. "The law sounds good, but what it does is it criminalizes the behavior of the businesses that have tried to survive."

Reach David Twiddy at 816-421-5900 or dtwiddy@bizjournals.com.

© 2003 American City Business Journals Inc.

[trebb]

did you see those news accounts?

Sure didn't - thanks...

[.cnI redruM]

I think it's a concept everyone has to interpret for themselves.....

In other words, I have no clue. I picked it on a whim.

[brownsfan]

pig latin??

No, that's Ig-pay Atin-lay! ;)

[.cnI redruM]

Read up on agency law in any business textbook. Walmart will argue that these contractors were independent agents. THis will make it harder for attorneys to pillage them...

[theartfuldodger]

I got an idea. Let's hold the INS responsible for any illegal aliens in this country.

[sphinx]

That is correct in principle, and WalMart will probably win. But the lawyers only have to get lucky with one jury. That's what this is about.

[steve8714]

One problem is that the INTENT of INS/DOJ related law can conflict with the government's instructions related to EEO. My boss went to a seminar and was told by regucrats there that if the documents presented have the proper form numbers on them, it is not the employers job to scrutinize those documents for legitimacy.
The question the is, would you rather have a $10,000.00 fine per worker, or a civil judgement which could be millions per worker?

[.cnI redruM]

To sue a corporation for the misdeeds of it's agents, one of two things have to be true. (In order to win).

> THe corporation has to be compromised. THis would be true if Walmart owned a lot of it's stock or if JimBob Walton VII was on its BoD.

> THe corporation has prior knowledge AND demonstrates willful complicity to the misdeeds in question.

THat's waht the plaintiff needs to prove in order to vampire Walmart.

[Chuckster]

A company is required by law to ensure that anyone they hire is in the country legally. BUT all they can do is ask the potential employee for a picture ID and Social Insecurity Card or immigration documents like a green card. go any further than that and you leave yourself open to a discrimination suit. If the new hire has presented fake documents, the employer is on the hook.

The only way to be safe is to have no employees at all.

[lilylangtree]

Still remember old Puce Pelosi and her socialist viewpoint on the raid. Apparently, the RATS lost some votes from the illegals that the RATS would make legal so they could vote for any and all RATS as a "thank you."

US Rep. Pelosi says Wal-Mart arrests "terrorizing"
Forbes ^ | 10-24-03 | Reuters

Posted on 10/24/2003 7:54 PM PDT by libertyisnotfree

US Rep. Pelosi says Wal-Mart arrests "terrorizing"

Reuters, 10.24.03, 6:15 PM ET

MEXICO CITY, Oct 24 (Reuters) - U.S. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said on Friday police raids on dozens of U.S. Wal-Mart stores in the search for illegal immigrants this week amounted to "terrorizing" workers.

"It instills a great deal of fear in people who are only trying to earn a living and put food on the table for their family," Pelosi, a California Democrat, told reporters on a Congressional visit to Mexico.

Hundreds of workers at Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (nyse: WMT - news - people) locations across the United States were arrested on immigration charges on Thursday in an investigation into contractor cleaning crews.

"We think there might be a better way to go about this because the fact is that it is against the law for the employer to hire these people so there should be more focus on the employer and less in these terrorizing raids," Pelosi said.

She was speaking after meeting Mexican President Vicente Fox for talks on immigration and border security.

Pelosi said the Wal-Mart raids showed the need to legalize undocumented workers in parts of the economy other than just the agricultural sector.

Several bills to grant legal status to illegal immigrants working in U.S. agriculture are before Congress, including the Berman-Cannon bill which would let an estimated 500,000 illegal immigrants earn legal residency.

Copyright 2003, Reuters News Service

[LibertySailor]

you want me to post links to them when I find them?

[LibertySailor]

Pelosi is pure scum IMHO

[LibertySailor]

LOL

[LibertySailor]

it sure is unique

[usurper]

The lawyers are going after WalMart because it has deep pockets, but it's still a dangerous precedent.

There is more to it than just that. Other competitors can sue WalMart for damages under RICO which caries significant recovery and punitive damage awards. They can claim that by hiring illegal aliens at substandard wages WalMart was able to gain an unfair and illegal market advantage.

When you think about how many companies WalMart has put out of operation, there are a lot potential litigants out there.

[JustPiper]

Especially if you're with Wal-Mart

WalMart Bash -sarcasm- I mean Ping!

[TLI]

INS.... try B.I.C.E.

http://www.bice.immigration.gov/graphics/index.htm

[LibertySailor]

LOL

[Don Corleone]

reads backward

[LibertySailor]

I did