Suing Competitors for Using Illegals
A new trend: businesses suing competitors for hiring illegal workers to achieve an unfair advantage.
In the first of a series of lawsuits, a temporary employment agency that supplies farm workers sued a grower and two competing companies on Monday.
Similar cases claiming violations of federal anti-racketeering laws have yielded mixed results. The California lawsuit is believed to be the first based on a state’s unfair-competition laws, legal experts said.
Global Horizons claimed in the lawsuit that Munger Brothers, a grower, hired illegal immigrant workers from Ayala Agricultural Services and J&A Contractors.
The suit alleges Munger Brothers had a contract with Global Horizons to provide more than 600 blueberry pickers this spring, but nixed the agreement so it could hire illegal immigrants.
“Competitors hiring illegal immigrants is hurting our business badly,” Global Horizons President . . . said. “It’s to the point that doing business legally isn’t worth it.”Ayala Agricultural Services’ manager . . . said the company does not hire undocumented immigrants.
Listen closely now, did he say they don’t hire illegal immigrants? One can be documented yet illegal: if the documents are forged.
“If somebody doesn’t have a green card or work documents, we don’t hire them,” he said.
Munger Brothers lawyer . . . said the contract with Global Horizons fell apart because the laborers they provided couldn’t pick blueberries at the promised rate.
Umm . . . gee . . . could that be because they were legal?
Legal experts said the cases could be difficult to win. Under the California statutes, plaintiffs must prove a competitor directly harmed their business.
Source:
AP (via SHRM) “Immigration issue goes to court.”
These new legal theories are nice if you’re going for big bucks. But simply turning in a competitor to immigration if you have evidence they’re hiring illegals could help deter this unfair competition.
I’ve heard that in some businesses that use many immigrants companies fear that if they don’t toe the line on immigration law compliance, their competitors will report them in a heartbeat (and the competitors will have heard about it because the immigrant communities know who’s legal or not and will talk). I don’t know how true that is, but if that’s the perception it can help keep businesses on the straight and narrow.
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