21 illegal aliens arrested in raid on restaurants
Posted on Thursday, May 24, 2007
Federal immigration agents arrested 21 illegal aliens Monday during a raid on a Northwest Arkansas Mexican restaurant chain, the U. S. attorney for the Western District of Arkansas announced Wednesday. The raid on Taqueria Michoacan restaurants in Springdale, Rogers and Lowell were conducted as Operation El Rancho Tejocote, prosecutor Bob Balfe said in a news release. Agents from U. S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement and local police served four search warrants, the release stated. Among those arrested were Honorato Pedroza and Gema Rivera, who were identified as “restaurant principals.” Pedroza is accused of operating an “unlicensed money transmitting business,” according to a complaint filed in U. S. District Court in Fayetteville. Rivera is accused of using fake identification documents to get a job at a Springdale motel.
Pedroza and Rivera appeared Wednesday before a federal magistrate judge in Fort Smith and were jailed there.
Temple Black, spokesman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s regional office in New Orleans, said the 19 others who were arrested are being held in Northwest Arkansas jails.
He couldn’t immediately provide names or details of the 19, but said immigration agents are checking to see if they have outstanding warrants before proceeding with deportation efforts.
There have been two known raids in the region this week. On Tuesday, immigration agents arrested more than 100 illegal aliens working at a George’s poultry processing plant in Butterfield, Mo., north of the Arkansas state line in Barry County, Mo.
Rogers Mayor Steve Womack said city officials cooperated with immigration agents during the raids.
“Personally, I think this is a product of a failed immigration policy on the part of the United States government, and we’re working to correct that,” he said.
Womack declined to provide details on the raids.
Both Rogers and Springdale have applied to a federal program that trains local police to enforce federal immigration laws.
Agents began investigating Pedroza in July 2006 and learned he’d opened a checking account at Arvest Bank using a phony Arkansas identification number, according to a court document.
Bank records showed Pedroza was routinely making large cash deposits and that the money was being transferred to Mexico, the complaint states.
Pedroza was transferring money through Sigue Corp., which the complaint describes as a “money service business” licensed by the U. S. Department of the Treasury.
Sigue conducts money transfers to Latin America, and in particular to Mexico, according to the corporation’s Web site. It operates in 48 states and says that it “supports the Hispanic community’s growing money transfer needs.”
A call to the company wasn’t immediately returned Wednesday.
The complaint states that between March 9 and Oct. 13, 2006, $ 295, 000 was illegally transferred from Pedroza’s account through Sigue to residents of Mexico.
Officials at Sigue told immigration agents that Pedroza had authorized the corporation to debit his account for Jose Salud Rivera, who is the registered agent of Taqueria Michoacan restaurants in Northwest Arkansas.
Pedroza is not licensed by the Treasury Department to operate a money service business, and he’s not authorized to transfer money outside of the country, the complaint states.
Records show money deposited by Pedroza was transferred to Mexico. One of the recipients was Salud Rivera, who was authorized by Sigue to act as its sole registered agent for Taqueria Michoacan.
About $ 120, 000 was transferred to an address associated with Salud Rivera between March and September 2006. Salud Rivera was convicted in 2003 in U. S. District Court in the Western District of Arkansas, according to the complaint. It’s not clear the crime of which he was convicted.
He was deported on Dec. 8, 2003.
Gema Rivera, whose relationship to Salud Rivera wasn’t clear Wednesday, is accused of providing phony identification documents to work at the Residence Inn by Marriott in Springdale, according to a complaint in her case.
She used a Social Security number that belongs to a 22-year-old woman, and she used an alien registration number that is assigned to yet another woman, the complaint states. Information for this article was contributed by The Associated Press.
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