Free Republic

A Shakopee couple pleaded guilty to federal charges Monday in what authorities characterized as a wide-ranging, multimillion-dollar income tax refund scheme that preyed on immigrants in Minnesota and Florida. Mark Arlin Hammerschmidt pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges and has agreed to cooperate with authorities investigating the scam. He faces up to nine years in prison. He also agreed to pay more than $1.8 million in restitution to victims.... ark Hammerschmidt obtained official identification papers for the Guatemalan victims and used them to obtain taxpayer identification numbers, then filed multiple years’ worth of fake tax returns in their names supported with...

Gov. Jerry Brown on Thursday signed a bill that will temporarily require overtime pay for domestic workers in California, after he vetoed a broader measure last year that critics said would have opened the door for government regulation of part-time baby-sitting. "Domestic workers are primarily women of color, many of them immigrants, and their work has not been respected in the past," the bill's author, Democratic Assemblyman Tom Ammiano of San Francisco, said in a statement. "Now, they will be entitled to overtime, like just about every other California working person."