Waterloo, IA – Sholom Rubashkin’s defense team has attacked the credibility of the state’s witnesses all week, and the judge on Thursday said he thought it was working.
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The defense has doggedly questioned why so many former workers gave several different ages to officials after a May 2008 immigration raid at Agriprocessors Inc. in Postville. They have also asked why most of the former workers don’t remember interviews with state investigators over the same time period.
Black Hawk County District Associate Judge Nathan Callahan said the defense, in his opinion, had successfully questioned the credibility of those witnesses.
“When you’ve got somebody who gets on the stand and says, ‘I don’t remember talking to anybody, ever,’ it’s a credibility problem if they’ve given a bunch of interviews,” Callahan said during a discussion with the defense and prosecution after the jury had left the courtroom for the day.
Rubashkin, a former plant executive, faces 83 misdemeanor child-labor charges. The state alleges he allowed minors to work excessive hours, and around poisonous chemicals and dangerous machinery.
After the jury left the courtroom, defense attorney F. Montgomery Brown asked the prosecution to turn over all evidence – if it hadn’t already – related to interviews of witnesses by government agents.
“We’re confronted with a roadblock of amnesia regarding the existence of these interviews,” he said.
Callahan, however, told Brown that he had no reason to believe the prosecution had withheld any evidence that might aid Rubashkin’s defense.
The fourth day of state witnesses included more testimony from young people who said they worked with bleach, sharp knives and other dangerous meat- processing equipment.
Yukary Hernandez Gonzalez, now 20, said her protective frock once caught on a conveyor belt, which then dragged her hand down the line.
“My hand started turning purple. I started yelling,” she said.
A co-worker eventually cut the sleeve off the frock to free her. She suffered bruises on her hand and continued working without medical care, she said.
Noe Castillo Ordonez said the plant rejected his job application several times because he appeared too young. Most other witnesses have said Agriprocessors hired them the first time they applied for a job.
The plant finally hired him, Ordonez said, when he produced a birth certificate that supposedly proved his age.
“I tried many times, but I don’t know exactly how many,” he said.
Ordonez also appeared to not know how old he was when a state prosecutor asked his age, and said he did not remember any interviews with government investigators.
All the workers said they lied about their ages to get jobs at the plant, and some have had trouble figuring out their ages on certain past dates. Ordonez was the first witness unable to correctly give his current age.
Ordonez always stated the same birthday in December 1990, but told the prosecutor he’s 20 years old, because “I’m starting my 20th year” in 2010.
“I want to make sure I understand accurately, because I’m confused now. Do you know for a fact what your date of birth is?” said Deputy Iowa Attorney General Thomas H. Miller.
“It’s the 16th of December, 1990,” Ordonez said through an interpreter.
Miller asked him how long he went to school and whether he’d learned his “addition and subtraction.” Ordonez said he had, and that he attended school for five years in Guatemala.
It’s amazing in general how the judicial system can accept witnesses who have a record of lying and then testifying about other people’s alleged behavior. They have a chazakah shakranus!
Hashem will help, keep praying
Let’s hope this will turn out for good with Hashems help
a bunch of ingrate mexicans.
You don’t have to be a rocket scientist, or even a judge to question the credibility of these bumbling buffoons who are testifying for their own personal gain to get whatever was promised them by the prosecution. Unfortunately in this legal system the only way to prove the obvious is with an expensive defense team.
This barely scratches the surface.What about that worker who lied and said he proceesed 90 chickens in 1 minute(he was debunked)!You can’t blame them though,they have to do their part for the goverment what gave them visas for this.
Well it seems all the witnesses got amnesia when asked about their conversations with State Prosecutors. And terrible , in a meat processing firm they worked with sharp knives and
bleach and ammonia. How about your cleaning girls from Mexico ? Have u ever checked their papers or age? Anyone? Edwin Black , an impartial investigating reporter just discovered that in the Fraud trial, Prosecutors asked vendors of Agri to calculate the time in last few years that they were paid late by Agri for interest penalties in the sentencing. This was a 1920’s Iowa rule never applied in over 75 years.! The above witness also sought to attack SMR because a woman caught her arm in a machine. Where doesn’t that happen
everyday. Is Bill Gates responsible if a computer or machine falls on an employee?
SMR no doubt made mistakes, and his defense is willing to accept a number of years. Remember similar cases in Iowa and monies (although most of SMR monies were “pristine’)
recieved one year. Jonathan Pollard was a spy , deserving to sit in jail. But he never had a trial and a plea bargain for spying for a freindly country. Did he deserve to sit his entire life
never convicted by a court!
Judge Linda wouldn’t have a problem we those as long as they testfy against a yid
bottom line – the kids weren’t exploited.
they provided false documents – and were in absolute desperate need of a job to save their family in Guatemala.
Rubashkin had much bigger problems than determining whether of not the documents were real or not. he was the freakin’ boss. Not the interview guy.
in Guatemala adults get paid 6-7 dollars a day. why do u think they all ran to postville. they heard of the opportunities. Rubashkin was literally a life saver for them.
These guys wanted the jobs so badly, that’s why they lied about their ages. Why should someone be prosecuted for hiring an underage worker who so deparately wants to work?
told the prosecutor he’s 20 years old, because “I’m starting my 20th year”
Interesting. Most people who are 20 years old are starting their 21st year. That’s why we make our first birthday when we finish our first year and start our second.
You don’t have to be a rocket scientist, or even a judge to question the credibility of these bumbling buffoons who are testifying for their own personal gain to get whatever was promised them by the prosecution. Unfortunately in this legal system the only way to prove the obvious is with an expensive defense team.
tate prosecutors and defense attorneys presented documents that showed the witness gave contradictory statements in an interview with an immigrant advocate in Florida in October 2008, and with a state criminal investigator at St. Bridget’s Catholic Church in December 2008. “Do you remember in a law enforcement interview, telling an agent that you were never injured while working ?” Weinhardt said. “I don’t remember. Every time I’ve been interviewed I’ve said what I said today,” said Yukary Hernandez Gonzalez, through an interpreter. Weinhardt then asked her the same questions several times, pursuing a direct answer. “If an interview report said you were never injured while working, are you telling us today that the interview report was wrong? And I think that’s a yes or no question,” he said. “I can’t say yes, because I don’t’ remember. I can’t say no, because I don’t want to say it’s wrong,” she responded. Weinhardt then asked if she remembered telling the state investigator in the same interview that she did not think it was obvious minors worked at the plant. “That I had said that? I don’t remember,” she said. “That ’s not exactly my question,” Weinhardt said. He then repeated the question several more times. “I don’t know, ” she said, shaking her head. Hernandez Gonzalez said she could see the minors because their faces were “like children. ” Assistant Iowa Attorney General Laura Roan then asked her if she remembered giving an interview to a Florida immigrant advocacy center in October 2008. Hernandez Gonzalez said she never gave an interview in Tallahassee while in federal prison. She served five months in prison after her arrest in the May 12, 2008 immigration raid on Agriprocessors. Roan then showed her signature on a copy of her interview with an immigrant center in Tallahassee. She said it was hers.
The DA bribed them with Work visas.
I love all these workers complaining as if they were offered work or health insurance in Mexico don’t work if you think the conditions are unsafe. What worse is that a lot of the worker should not be asked to testify since they are all illegal. For example if you commit a crime why should anyone beleive you.
please people dont stop to be mispalell thats the only hope
I personally believe these stories of the underage illegals. WHY? I worked in a meat processing plant in Penna. for 4 yrs. The owner would hire the ILLEGALS through a temp service out of Phila. These guys and women would work MON THRU SUN, 7 dys a wk for STRAIGHT TIME. NO OT.
One of the owners was a YID.
He would rent them apts in a house he owned deducting the rent from their pay, before paying the temp service. This way he aqlways said, I don’t know anything. The temp service is the problem.. The USDA also knew and saw what was going on.
It didn’t matter were they worked. In the plant, or on his estate.
TThey would also have a company car to drive, even though they didn’t have a drivers license, and were UNINSURED.
Anyone that thinks this type of activity doesn’t go on, has stheir heads in the sands.
So don’t tell me about MR. This guy is a a low down crook who is finally getting what he deserves.
Okay bottom line, he lied and he new that he was hiring underage illegal workers. As an employer, I am required by law to get documentation on all new hires. There’s a free service open to ALL employers that’s offered by DHS. After going through a training session on line and taking an on line test, you can check the validity of the documentation of any non US citizen.
I know SEVERAL companies run by “Frum” Yidden that hire these questionable people and these same Yidden blindly accept these questionable documents. Why? Because it’s CHEAP labor. It’s one thing to hire underage workers, there’s NO excuse for that, it’s a totally different thing to hire illegal aliens. Yes it’s expensive to run a busines properly and by the books, but isn’t that what WE Yidden are instructed to by the Torah? Just because it’s expensive to hire “properly” documented people and pay them accordingly, is NOT a valid excuse to NOT play by the rules.
Now, I will also say that I do believe that Rubashin is being made an example of and the government IS going out of its way to “get” him. That said, would this conversation even be taking place if the accused wasn’t a Frum Yid?
On a previous news post regarding SMR’s trial for hiring minors, there was someone who posted and sounded like a neo-Nazi or KKK member. Turns out he was none other than a frum Jew.
Yes, those who say not a word about ALL the the goyishe businesses that hire these MILLIONS of illegals, all the illegals breaking the law themselves, lying falsifying doc. nobody gets the rap only when they’re Jewish. Like post #31 lays it out like it is. The temps hiring illegals-no problem, his goyishe bosses knowingly emplyoing illegals- also no problem- BUT HIS ONE JEWISH BOSS IS THE PROBLEM!!!!
With what are you people, you Jewish jew bashers different than ant-Semites when you continue to single out the Jew for persecution while all others get off the hook?
Why didn’t AGRI just hire a legal work force? Then none of this would be happening. It’s not difficult to match a real social security number to an ID. It just takes the will and the time. Thousands of companies hire only legal workers. I know that a lot of slaughter houses hire illegals but they are goyim. Shouldn’t a kosher and frum owner slaughter house be better then the rest? Bottom line is if the work force had been legal, SMR wouldn’t be on trial. The buck stops with the owner and if laws were broken, it’s the owner that answers for them. Whether he is found guilty or not is another matter, but why couldn’t he only hire legals?
In 2003, then-President of Mexico, Vicente Fox stated that remittances “are our biggest source of foreign income, bigger than oil, tourism or foreign investment” and that “the money transfers grew after Mexican consulates started giving identity cards to their citizens in the United States.” He stated that money sent from Mexican workers in the United States to their families back home reached a record $12 billion.[29] Two years later, in 2005, the World Bank stated that Mexico was receiving $18.1 billion in remittances and that it ranked third (behind only India and China) among the countries receiving the greatest amount of remittances.
A federal Mexican agency directed to Mexicans migrating to and residing in the United States advice on how to get across the U.S. border illegally, where to find healthcare, enroll their children in public schools, and send money to Mexico.
In 2005 the government of Yucatan produced a handbook and DVD about the risks and implications of crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. The guide told immigrants where to find health care, how to get their kids into U.S. schools, and how to send money home. Officials in Yucatan said the guide is a necessity to save lives but some American groups accused the government of encouraging illegal immigration.
In 2005 the Mexican government was criticized for distributing a comic book which offers tips to illegal aliens emigrating to the United States.
#55 doesn’t want a salmonella in his franks or or a finger in his beef. Therefore, he endorses SMR being singled out from other meat processing plants having the same hiring practices.
#53 has selective reading problems as he doesn’t see that there are plenty of articles about goyishe criminals on this site. He also writes that there are a hundred comments or more each SWEARING that Rubashkin did nothing illegal.
People who don’t care about the facts when it doesn’t suit their purpose, are severely defficient in common sense, and there’s nothing one can do about it.