Federal investigators arrested yesterday 11 suspected illegal immigrants who were working for private construction firms on renovation projects at Fort Meade.
Twenty agents from the Immigration and Naturalization Service arrested two Mexicans, three Hondurans and six Salvadorans-- all adult men-- in a raid at 10 a.m. at the Army post, said Richard C. Caterisano, deputy district director with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service in Maryland.
He said immigration officials received a tip that general contractors and subcontractors refurbishing living quarters at Fort Meade had hired illegal aliens.
INS agents cooperated with the post commander to plan yesterday's raid, Caterisano said.
"We did receive some leads that there were some unauthorized workers at this facility," he said.
Nine of the immigrants were taken to the Howard County Detention Center, where six were being held in lieu of $1,500 bail each. They can post bail, return voluntarily to their country of origin or await a hearing before an immigration judge and risk deportation, INS officials said.
Three workers are being held without bond because they had been issued "final deportation orders" by a U.S. immigration judge, said Barry Tang, assistant district director for investigations for INS.
Tang said INS officials released two of the Honduran immigrants yesterday and permitted them to remain in the United States temporarily because of hardship conditions in their homeland caused by Hurricane Mitch.
Officials said the immigrants were employed by SJC Corp. and Napa Development Corp., both based in Washington, and Diamond Wood Contractors of Pasadena.
Officials with the companies denied hiring illegal immigrants.
Gladys Antezana, president of Napa Development Corp., said that as far as she knew, all nine of her employees at the Fort Meade job have proper documentation to work.
Antezana said the two arrested workers were not carrying their work papers yesterday.
"It's a matter of someone not coming to work with their ID on them on a particular day," said Bob Anderson, project manager for Napa.
Two people who answered calls yesterday at SJC Corp. and Diamond Wood Contractors but refused to give their names said their immigrant employees had proper work documents.
INS officials said they are investigating the three employers to determine if they violated immigration laws by knowingly hiring unauthorized workers.
Pub Date: 3/18/99