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Thursday, May 11, 2006 4:10 PM CDT
BREAKING: 3rd restaurant owner arrested on immigration charges; restaurant in Missouri also raided
By JEFF REINITZ, Courier Staff Writer

CEDAR FALLS --- A rental agreement and a car crash spiraled into an immigration investigation that led to a raid at Cedar Falls restaurant last month.

This according to court records unsealed today as federal charges were filed against Julio Zapala-Urbina, the third co-owner of Julio's Mexican Restaurant and Cantina.

Zapala, who owns 50 percent of the business and is its president and chairman, was charged with harboring and engaging in a practice of employing illegal aliens in U.S. District Court in Cedar Rapids.

 
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He was arrested Wednesday night and appeared in a federal court in Kansas City, Mo., today, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Peter Deegan in Cedar Rapids.

Agents with the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement searched Julio's in Cedar Falls April 27, and co-owners Martha Lopez-Angel and Juan Manuel Lopez-Angel were arrested on immigration charges a week later.

Then on Wednesday, ICE officers raided another restaurant owned by Zapala, this one in St. Joseph, Mo., and found nine undocumented aliens. Zapala also owns a restaurant in Maryville, Mo.

Authorities seized $17,000 in cash during the Cedar Falls search and froze the restaurant's bank account, records state.

After the Cedar Falls raid, Zapala moved staff from his St. Joseph operation to keep the Cedar Falls restaurant running, records state.

"Businesses who knowingly employ illegal aliens are on notice that they will be criminally prosecuted," said Pete Baird, assistant special agent-in-charge of the ICE Office of Investigations in Kansas City.

"Using ICE's unique immigration and customs law enforcement authorities, we'll also make every effort to seize all assets that may be associated with the illegal activity," he said.

Julio's Mexican Restaurant and Cantina opened in the former Camp David steak house building in February.

Records show investigators became suspicious in March when Julio's employee Guadalupe Mendoza-Nava applied to live at Country Terrace Mobile Home Village in Cedar Falls. Mendoza listed his place of employment, but the Social Security number he used on the application was discovered to be invalid during a credit check.

Then on April 10, ICE agents detained two unnamed Julio's employees after they were involved in a traffic accident in Benton County.

Both said they were from Mexico and entered the United States illegally. They also said they weren't asked to show proof they were authorized to work in American and didn't complete any paperwork when they were hired. They said they were paid in cash.

Later in April, source working with ICE authorities approached co-owner Juan Lopez at Julio's, and Lopez told him could earn $580 in cash a week as a dishwasher.

Lopez also told the source he didn't need a Social Security Card or a Permanent Resident Alien Card to get the job and that he may be able to talk with other employees about obtaining bogus documents, records state.

The following day, the source worked a full day without showing any documentation and without filling out any paperwork,

The restaurant was raided April 27, and 12 workers were taken into custody.

Four days later --- on May 1 --- immigration agents returned and detained another undocumented Julio's employee, who is identified in records only as Subject No. 7. He said Zapala told him to travel to Iowa to help reopen the Cedar Falls restaurant after the raid, records state.

This wasn't Subject No. 7's first brush with authorities. He had been arrested by ICE agents in February in St. Joseph and placed on supervised release.

At the time, he had been working for Julio's in Missouri and told his manager about the arrest. He was allowed to return to work after showing a card that gives no official employment authorization, records state.

The Wednesday raid at Julio's in St. Joseph found nine undocumented workers who were taken into custody. Other than the nine, only Zapala, his girlfriend and another person were working at the business, records state.

The raids were part of the Department of Homeland Security's Secure Border Initiative.

Under SBI, Homeland Security seeks to gain operational control of the borders while re-engineering the detention and removal system to ensure that illegal aliens are removed from the country quickly and efficiently.

SBI also involves strong interior enforcement efforts, including enhanced worksite enforcement investigations and intensified efforts to track down and remove illegal aliens inside this country.

Contact Jeff Reinitz at (319) 291-1578 or jeff.reinitz@wcfcourier.com.



DISCLAIMER: All comments will be approved by an editor. Your comment should be up shortly. Please keep all comments clear of any profanity. We have the right to delete and/or edit any and all comments.
Total comments 5

dolly wrote on May 19, 2006 12:41 PM:"i think that if you can speak more than 1 language its great.......... i have 2 children that go to west high in waterloo there r many kids there and many languages.and many kids that speak only 1 language..............god put us all on earth as 1 happy family.........now they say only speak english.......what a joke my son can speak english, spanish and bosian and so can his 2 friends that r from bosnia and honduras so i think that if u speak more than 1 language u can get further in life........... so why dont people grow up and stop picking on the mexicans and bosian's and as rodney once said " can't we all just get along " lol"

Brenda wrote on May 12, 2006 2:29 PM:"I do want to add that if this is being done in Mexican Restaurant, it should also be done in Chinese restaurants. When I went to high school, I met a family that owns several Chinese restaurants. They also hire undocumented immigrants. They are also paid in cash and do not report it to the IRS. I strongly believe that most people being watched are hispanics, however, to be fair, more investigations should be done with this other communities. I can find plenty of places where this type of activities are being committed. Chinese immigrants do not pay taxes! They own a lot of restaurants and luxyrious homes by avoiding to pay the correct amount of taxes! I think, all immigrants have to be checked! I hope the media begins to inform that not only Mexicans cross the border. There are plenty of Africans, chinese, middle eastern too. They go to other countries in Central and South America and pay to sneak in. "

Fred Kossow, Gridley,Ca. one pissed off WW2 Vet. wrote on May 12, 2006 12:19 PM:"Why doesn't ICE go after Tyson Foods and the whole meat industry, in stead of these little nickel dime business places"

mfd wrote on May 12, 2006 9:54 AM:"US citizens are not the only people authorized to operate businesses, so are legal permanent residents. There is no indication in this article that the person that they are talking about is not legally in the United States. Moreover, previous articles about this individual identified him as a U.S. citizen. You are assuming that he is not legally here just because he has a Spanish last name. "

teddyd wrote on May 11, 2006 7:06 PM:"something is wrong with the entire system when you can get all the necessary liscenses to operate a business without somewhere along the line proving you are a US citizen....this is Homeland Security? What is wrong with this picture? Makes the whole thing laughable. Where was Homeland Security when he applied for his loan? "




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