Fake goods lead police to illegal alien at fair
Posted on Tuesday, October 14, 2008
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/adg/News/240231/
At least a dozen people get arrested at the Arkansas State Fair and Livestock Show every year.
Just not the way it happened to Bourkare Ouiya, 52, of Aurora, Colo.
Little Rock police and U. S. customs and immigration officials found Ouiya selling counterfeit name-brand shoes and purses and discovered that he was from North Africa originally and was in the United States illegally.
He remained in the Lonoke city jail, held by the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, on Monday.
And while it is his immigration status that led to his arrest, it is the 179 pairs of fake Nike shoes and 210 purported designer purses — 102 from Coach, 48 from Chanel, 24 from Dolce & Gabbana, 20 from Louis Vuitton, 12 from Gucci, two from Kate Spade and one each from Fendi and Christian Dior — that have police and fair officials the most curious.
“This is probably the first I’ve seen of a commercial vendor selling counterfeit items,” Ralph Shoptaw, the fair’s president and general manager since 2005, said Monday. “I just heard about this for the first time last night and I can tell you I was surprised.”
Little Rock Police Department spokesman Lt. Terry Hastings said officers usually arrest as many as 25 or 30 people during the course of the State Fair.
“But mostly it’s drunks or people being disorderly, maybe the occasional assault or something like that,” he said. “This is a new one on me.”
It seems, too, to be novel from a national perspective.
“I have not heard of that hap- Little Rock police Lt. Terry Hastings shows what is believed to be counterfeit clothing that was seized after an illegal-alien vendor was arrested Friday at the State Fair. did not know specifically what — and Ouiya insisted he didn’t own the booth, he just worked there.
Ouiya tried to call a person he said was the owner but failed to reach the person, police said. Ouiya told police he could not recall the owner’s name.
Shoptaw said the booth was on the carnival portion of the fair complex, controlled by a Florida-based contractor, Deggeller Attractions Inc. Attempts to reach the owners of Deggeller Attractions by phone and e-mail were unsuccessful Monday.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials were unavailable to discuss the case Monday because of the Columbus Day holiday.
Brett Shippe, a dispatcher and jailer for the city of Lonoke, said late Monday afternoon that he did not know the amount of Ouiya’s bail, only that Ouiya was still in custody.
The fair’s policy, which does not apply to the contractor, Shoptaw said, is for each vendor to fill out a written application.
“ We have a woman here on staff who checks all their references,” he said. “And the world of fairs like ours is pretty small, so if there’s been a problem somewhere else, we hear about it and will not sign a contract with that vendor. Don’t know that that would’ve helped us much here, but it is what it is. Weird situation.” pening with any regularity at all, ” said Marla Calico, director of grants and special education for the International Association of Fairs and Expositions, based in Springfield. “I would have to say such an incident would be quite isolated.”
Ruth Hadle, executive secretary and treasurer of the Kansas Fairs and Festivals Association, said the topic of counterfeit goods was never even mentioned when she spoke with members of her organization about discussion topics for their 2009 conference.
“It’s really not anything I’ve heard anything about,” she said.
Shoptaw and Hastings said they could think of no crime in selling counterfeit items as long as the buyers knew what they bought was fake.
“I can’t see anything in the law you could charge anybody with on that,” Hastings said. “It’s copyright law or intellectual property or something you could argue about as a civil matter.”
Little Rock police said vice officers were on a walk-through of the fair complex with federal customs agents Friday afternoon when they saw Ouiya’s booth. Something prompted them to call in immigration officials — Hastings said Monday he