Arrested immigrants sue Wal-Mart, others
Immigrants claim
rights were violated

BY SANDI CARPELLO & JENNIFER DOME

Staff Writers

Eunice Gomez does not want to go home. Despite her inability to find work, the constant struggle to make her $2,000-a-month rent, being forced to eat noodles for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and the imminent threat of deportation, the 26-year-old illegal immigrant loves America.

"I don’t want to go back there," said Gomez, recalling the poor living conditions and lack of educational opportunities for poor people in her native Mexico City. "We love it here. We thank God that we are healthy and that I’m with my family and that we are together."

Gomez has lived in Red Bank for three years with her husband, father-in-law, and three young children. Her children, Miguel, 7, Vanessa, 10, and Erick, 5, all born in Mexico, attend the Red Bank Primary School.

Along with other immigrants, Gomez was arrested by federal immigration agents on Oct. 23 as she finished the night shift cleaning the Wal-Mart on Route 9 in Old Bridge. She and the other immigrants arrested were charged with immigration violations.

After her arrest, Gomez was taken to immigration headquarters. Terrified and heartbroken, "All I could think about were my children who were home alone (at the time)," she said.

She and her husband, Victor Zavala Jr., and her father-in-law, Victor Zavala Sr., face deportation when they appear before an immigration judge this week.

Since Oct. 23, Gomez and her family have been living hand to mouth. Though she has gone from business to business looking for work, she has not had any luck. And finding work is a toss-up for her husband and her father-in-law, who wait anxiously for day labor at the Red Bank train station at 6 a.m. each morning.

All three adults in the family are among the plaintiffs in a class-action complaint that was filed Nov. 10 with the U.S. District Court in Newark. The suit alleges that the Wal-Mart Corp. and the company’s janitorial contractors violated "immigration and protective wage and hour laws and other laws for their own profit and benefit."

The complaint was filed on behalf of the plaintiffs by three different law firms based in New York, New Jersey and California.

The other plaintiffs listed on the lawsuit — who worked at either the Wal-Mart in Old Bridge or in Piscataway — are Octavio Denisio, Hipolito Palacios, Antonio Flores, Carlos Alberto Tello, Maximiliano Mendez and Felipe Condado. All the plaintiffs were arrested as part of the federal immigration raid on Oct. 23 and are undocumented aliens and natives of Mexico.

According to the lawsuit, which was provided by attorney James L. Linsey of Cohen, Weiss and Simon in New York, federal immigration officials raided Wal-Mart stores in 21 states across the country on Oct. 23. The federal officials also raided the corporation’s headquarters in Arkansas, "seizing documents and materials as part of an ongoing criminal investigation."

The lawsuit was filed soon thereafter, alleging that Wal-Mart and the companies who contracted cleaning services for the corporation violated the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Civil Rights Act, the state Wage and Hour Law, and the state Law Against Discrimination. The cleaning contractors included in the lawsuit are Facility Solutions Inc., Facility Solutions International and Mitchell Industries — all companies owned by Kenneth Clancy, a resident of Millstone Township, and other family members, the lawsuit states.

Clancy did not return phone calls seeking comment on the suit.

Other defendants specifically named in the lawsuit are Giovanni Alabena, the principal of Ruth and Sons; Felipe Soto, owner of JWM Commercial Cleaning; and Raul Tijerino, the principal of RT Cleaning.

"We were shocked by the raids," said Wal-Mart spokeswoman Sharon Weber. "We didn’t know they were coming."

According to Weber, Wal-Mart has started its own investigation into the immigration status of its employees.

"We want to find out what happened too," Weber said.

The introduction of the lawsuit states that all eight plaintiffs listed were required to work seven days a week for about 60 hours each week, with no overtime payment. None of the immigrants received health insurance benefits, sick leave or disability benefits, the lawsuit states. While the length of employment with the companies, and subsequently Wal-Mart, varies, the plaintiffs were each paid between $350 and $500 a week for their work.

The lawsuit claims that since 2000, "Wal-Mart and the contractor defendants have engaged in and profited from a nationwide fraudulent scheme designed to defraud the United States government through the non-payment of taxes and injure and exploit the plaintiffs and those similarly situated through wide scale violation of protective federal and state labor and employment law."

"We, obviously, do not condone the use of illegal workers at Wal-Mart, or anywhere," Weber said.

She added that the corporation requires its third-party contractors to have all the necessary documentation for employees.

In response to the immigrants’ lawsuit, Weber said, "We plan to move quickly for dismissal."