Posted on 03/07/2008 4:47:22 PM PST by csvset
NORFOLK - A contractor who hired illegal immigrants to dig ditches for a Verizon project was sentenced Friday to 14 months in prison.
Robert Buttery Sr., 53, of Fauquier County, pleaded guilty to hiring, housing and transporting the undocumented workers for his company, B&B Cable. He was caught after a state trooper stopped a van on Interstate 264 last summer and discovered 14 of his workers in the back.
U.S. District Judge Jerome B. Friedman denied a request from Buttery’s attorney to spare his client jail time.
The lawyer, George Yates of Virginia Beach, pleaded with the judge to take a political stand.
“Mr. Buttery is a small potato,” Yates said. “There are millions of Americans committing crimes by hiring illegal aliens and we turn the other way.”
“I don’t quite understand where you’re coming from,” Friedman said.
“I’m just asking the court to put this in context,” Yates said, noting there are an estimated 20 million illegal immigrants working in the country.
“Depending on who gets elected, it may very well be legal to hire these people,” Yates continued. “John McCain doesn’t want to send them back. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama don’t want to send them back.”
“My job is to follow the law,” Friedman interrupted, adding that he cannot be concerned about political matters.
Assistant U.S. Attorney James Metcalfe argued that Buttery could have faced substantial more time had the government decided to indict him on money laundering and tax evasion charges.
Metcalfe said the Buttery operation grossed $1.8 million in about four years of employing illegal immigrants and in that time the company paid no Social Security or Medicare taxes.
The government is seeking $250,000 in restitution, but Yates informed the court that Buttery is broke.
The Buttery company hired dozens of illegal immigrants to dig ditches for Verizon’s fiber-optic lines. Workers were paid $100 per day for a 12-hour shift minus $60 a week for housing and utilities, according to court records. Some said they were put up in a house off Oceana Boulevard in Virginia Beach.
B&B was hired by Ivy H. Smith Inc., a Greensboro, N.C.-based company that was a subcontractor for Fiber Technology Construction Inc., of Canton, Ga., that held a contract with Verizon Communications. Neither company has been accused of any wrongdoing.
Sheesh...why don’t they make him do something useful....like build something.....clean streets, do time on the border....something besides just stick him in prison. Seems stupid.
He IS doing something useful ... he is serving as an example ... put his ass on a chain gang
Best he go to prison for a while.
Otherwise maybe we could use him to practice torture techniques.
Whatever, I'd pay admission to watch that.
I love this judge!
>> the Buttery operation grossed $1.8 million in about four years of employing illegal immigrants
Try paying citizen employees half a million dollars off the books for four years and take a guess what the consequences might be.
Now I love this judge!
Way to go man!
We need more judges like this. It won’t take many convictions to make the other employers take notice. I don’t understand why the Assistant U.S. Attorney decided not to indict him on money laundering and tax evasion charges. I guess there are thousands of U.S. Attorney’s selecting which crimes to prosecute and we turn the other way.
Maybe we should send this judge a valentine...”Thanks for enforcing the law!”
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/VA-news/VA-Pilot/issues/1997/vp970627/06270674.htm
This Judge was appointed by Clinton, believe it or not.
Sorry about that.
These workers are 1099. They are responsible for paying their own taxes.
Well, thank God there is one Judge in America who follows the law. I'm sorry to see the man go to prison, but he put himself there. No excuses, no tolerance. We have to start somewhere, so it might as well start with him. This might just wake other employers up to the fact that they are NOT above the law! When you break the law, there are consequences!
Based on the headline only -—
GREAT NEWS!
Ping!
Hope this is a harbinger of things to come.
So, what happened to all the illegal immigrants that he hired? Probably given a court summons and released.
What is good for the goose should be good for all the ganders.
I whole heartily agree that those who hire illegal immigrants should suffer the consequences. However, the illegal immigrants hired should suffer the same punishment and deported, I mean, after all, they ARE illegal. ;-)
You can't afford it.
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