A Santa Monica temp agency alleges a grower and two firms violated a state law on unfair
competition by using undocumented workers.

By Molly Selvin

Opponents of illegal immigration are using a new legal tactic: Suing businesses that allegedly hire illegal workers, contending they gain an unfair competitive advantage.

In a complaint filed Monday, a Santa Monica-based temporary employment agency that supplies legal farmworkers sued a Central Valley blueberry grower and two other companies. The agency contends that the grower hired illegal workers, violating a contract to use the agency's employees.

The California lawsuit is believed to be the first based on the state's unfair-competition law, legal experts said. Although the case may be difficult to win, they said, it seeks to highlight widespread criticisms that the federal government is ineffective in enforcing laws barring the hiring of illegal workers.

BY JIM FABER, The Island Packet

 When Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents found problems last month with the citizenship status of 43 employees of the Hilton Head Island Bi-Lo store, questions were raised as to why the store didn't check out their employees more thoroughly.

But, according to experts, just about any business could find itself in the same position.

Properly completing citizen and identity verification forms, called the I-9 form, is all a business can, and probably should, do in attempting to thwart fraud from those seeking employment illegally, according to a local immigration law expert and the government's guidelines.

"Employers are not required to be immigration experts," said Melissa Azallion, a labor and immigration lawyer with the Hilton Head office of the law firm Nexsen Pruet. "They are required to use a reasonable good-faith effort to examine those documents."

Wichita Business Journal - 2:22 PM CDT Thursdayby Ken Vandruff

The owner and two employees of a Wichita powder coating company are named in a 28-count federal indictment charging them with knowingly hiring illegal aliens.

The charges against Bob Eisel, owner and president of Bob Eisel Powder Coatings, Kenric "Butch" Steinert, the company's general manager, and Troy Hook, company foreman, include making false statements, misusing Social Security numbers, receiving false documents for employment in the United States, aggravated identity theft and harboring illegal aliens.

According to the indictment, the company was warned that employees were using false Social Security numbers and in response, Eisel, Steinert and Hook allegedly told the employees to get different numbers if they wanted to keep their jobs.