Postville, IA – Former Agriprocessors manager Sholom Rubashkin wants all 9,000 state child labor charges filed against him dismissed.
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Prosecutors allege Rubashkin allowed children under 18 to work at the Postville meat-packing plant, and in some cases, handle dangerous equipment.
Rubashkin’s attorneys filed the motion in Allamakee County district court saying the minors gave false birth certificates to gain employment.
Rubashkin also faces federal bank fraud and immigration-related charges following the immigration raid there last May.
9,000 state child labor charges is a sham!
There were 57 or so workers under 18 who lied about their age to gain employment.
The prosecutors publicize the 9,000 charges to inflate their case.
Doesn’t every accused criminal want charges against them dismissed?
Why shouldn’t he “want”?
Typically, in applying or a position, one would fill out a job application and gives his date of birth. As documentary evidence, a photocopy of the applicant’s driver’s license or, U.S. passport would be taken and put into the file.
Never, Never is an original birth certificate ever given in the job application process.
The problem in this scenario is that the applicants were apparently not in the country long enough to even have had a driver’s license and certainly not any authentic social security cards and most likely never even brought their Central American/Polish birth certificates with them. That is why they are considered “undocumented” workers. The noose is certainly tightening.
B”H
The Aybishter should help so Rubashkin can be freed for good.
If he did anything not 100% correct I am sure he learned a lesson by now and would never repeat the error.
Every Jew with a heart who has Ahavas Yisroel is davening that he should be free and be able to raise all his children, etc.
Each hour that a seventeen yr. old worked was considered a new charge.
please explain.
The same phenomena is occurring across Jewish businesses.
Something doesn’t make sense here. An employee has to provide more than just a birth certificate when completing an I9, and the employer has a responsibility to verify the documentation provided. So if these employees lied about their age and only provided a false birth certificate, they still would not meet the minimum documentation requied by law.
9000 charges ???
Is this Prosecutor having mental problems ?
The 9000 figure is the number of days the underage workers worked with fake documents.
The prosecutors charged Rubashkin with one charge for each day, thus 9,000 charges.
The media and prosecutors and politicians here in Iowa publicize the 9000 figure to inflate their case against Rubashkin.
All together there were 50 or so underaged workers who lied.
This is getting old already. Make Rubashkin pay a fine, release him, and end this nonsense that seems to only serve to give some prosecutor a stepping stone to a bigger career.
Let’s hope it works. My feelings go out for his family. While I haven’t bought at Rubashkin ever since KAJ announced their rescinding of their Hechsher, a fellow Yid is being accused of things seemingly to be a government scapegoat because he was matzliach. We need to prove this was a witch-hunt. Unfortunately, Rubashkin himself used the illegal immigrant claim to his benefit in a prior court-case, so he can’t claim to not know he ws employing the illegal immigrants. The witch-hunt seems to be to point the application processing at Sholom’s feet at which false doc’s were provided by “someone” in Rubashkin to qualify the employee for pay. Now that’s a tough sell.
Look at this, when ever there is a Rubashkin news, Rubashkin supporters always mention “Hashem, Eibeshter, Mespallel, Yeshou, etc,” anti Rubashkin, always mention , “Government, Low, Labor, Minor, etc, the closer then can get to Yideshkeit is Chillul hashem (is their definition) this is a fact, check it
you may not be able to tell a forged document but you sure can tell from looks of a person . a 12 -13 year old does not look 18. stop with this cover up already
Underage Workers.
Have you ever visited developing and third world nations? I just spent close to a month in Cancun working with a Pesach program. About one third of the legal workers in the hotels are high school aged. This is normal in these countries just as it was normal for your bubie and zayde to be married when they were teenagers and for your zayde to go out and get a job at age 14 or 16.
These “under age children” come here to work because they can make incredible money compared to what they could make back home, if they could find work there.
Sholom Mordechai Rubashkin was not an employee in the human resources department. So he couldnt tell from looks or whatever, and besides it is possible that they werent under the age of 15 and they very well may be able to pass as 18.
The only wrong thing is that Rubashkin made was a formidable tool for Kashrus and that was very good for all of us. Many places do not have anymore kosher meat because of what happened. Only one is happy of that: satan! We have to support Rubashkin in anyway, because we are closed to Melech HaMoshiach and because are going to win!
Prison is NOT a place to rehabilitate.
You are a number and not treated as a human being.
Everything is taken away from you
Ane even upon your release there’s so many things that can’t be restored so easily.
Corporate illegalities are rife throughout the economy… Between 1990 and 2001, the world’s largest corporation and one of the most highly respected, GE, was indicted on 42 MAJOR legal breaches, including fraud, safety breaches, pollution, deceptive advertising … costing them about $557 million (not counting many other court orders to clean up pollution that they had to finance). But they are still trading and no one went to prison. Source: The Corporation, by Joel Bakan, page 75.
65% of all apparel operations in NY city are sweatshops. 50,000 workers. 4,500 factories… The overall compliance with minimum wage, overtime and Child Labor Standards Act is 33% (ibid p74-75)
Rubshkin’s Company may well have committed crimes, but he is not being prosecuted to send a message to other companies, rather because his business is non-essential to the US economy, and because he is a private owner, not a corporation. Of course anti-semitism can also play a role, if not on a state level, then on a personal level. But the authorities have to be seen to be doing something, sometimes, so he was an obvious choice.
With all being said , even if he did break the law, the destruction the prosecutors accomplished here is undescribable. The authorities don’t need much brains to realize how they turned a thriving flourishing state into a ghost town. This was inhumane treatment to the Mexicans who are now suffering, leaving behind cars and furniture etc. trying to suppport families. Schools were left empty, farmers have no one to sell to, IGA and Walmart are empty. Of course the whole frum kehilla are now suffering with no one to support one of the the best mesiftas. Many cannot afford to send their child there anymore. Millions of dollars were circulating throughout this town and not by taking anything from anyone. So a goyishe kop is a goyishe kop, no leeways, you broke the law so therefore the banks have to lose their money and hundreds have to go on welfare in an already bad economy. So tell me some of you out there seem to have that same goyishe kop. You know when a yid was chayov misa how many details had to be in place in order to execute that to prevent it from happening. You know how many heteirim there are in different circumstances when you look at the whole picture so the destruction here is far more extensive then the great damage that was done by these illegals working