Dozens of Nepalese Workers Missing From Ala. Plant
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HUNTSVILLE, Ala. About 100 people who came from Nepal to work at a north Alabama factory seemingly vanished from a pair of apartment buildings, along with a lot of furniture and appliances, and can’t be located, officials said Tuesday.
Immigration agents are trying to determine what happened to the Nepalese workers, among hundreds brought to the United States to work at a DVD factory operated by Cinram Inc., said Lauren Bethune, a spokeswoman for the Alabama Department of Homeland Security.
{snip}
Cinram’s human resources director, Peter Hassler, did not immediately return a telephone call seeking comment. But a spokesman for a company that recruited the workers for Cinram said a contact in Nepal believes many of them have returned home.
{snip}
Mary and Tim Snopl told the TV station they rented apartments in two buildings last fall to about 240 workers from Nepal. But Mary Snopl said scores of the workers are now missing, along with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of furniture, televisions and kitchenware.
{snip}
Wilson said his company was seeking a list of items believed to be missing.
Reports last fall said Cinram had hired about 1,350 foreign workers to package DVDs at its plant in Huntsville. Cinram—which describes itself as the world’s largest maker of pre-recorded multimedia products—said it turned to foreign workers because the area job market couldn’t fill its needs.
Bethune said about 100 immigrants were believed to be missing. Agents are trying to determine exactly what type of visas they used to enter the United States.
{snip}
(Posted on February 4, 2008)
Comments
You don’t suppose they are working at the whitehouse do you???? Hey…I wouldn’t doubt that for a minute!
Posted by lydia at 6:43 PM on February 4
Alabama is chock full of unemployed blacks, yet the company had to turn to foreign workers? From Nepal? What, not enough illegal Mexicans in Alabama? Give me a break!
Posted by CDE at 7:03 PM on February 4
Again we see the proof that cheap labor ain’t cheap.
Posted by RaceandCountry at 8:07 PM on February 4
There are a lot of angles to this story.
First, you’ve got this company importing all these foreign workers “to meet its needs” for cheap labor. The company must have laid them all off after they squeezed the last amount of work out of them because the company’s HR department didn’t know what had happened to them. Disposable wage-slaves. That’s what they were. Use them and forget them. You’d think that controls on foreign guest-workers would be more stringent considering the War On Terror and all. Apparently not.
Second, you’ve got these landlords who were putting them up hundreds at a time, only to get ripped off when they all mysteriously vanished. Personally, I call that poetic justice. The landlords weren’t doing anything illegal by renting them a place to live, but they were profiting from this system which is trashing our culture, driving down wages and putting so many Americans out of work. I’m glad they got robbed. I consider it a form of windfall-profits tax.
Third, you’ve got the Homeland Security Administration, which doesn’t have a clue where these people went or what kind of visas they used to get into the country. You’d think HSA would screen foreign workers coming in on visas and at least be aware of when they left the country again, but apparently that’s too much bother. Seven years after 9/11, the Feds still can’t cope with something as basic as controlling the way foreign guest workers enter and leave the country. The Feds are incompetent, no doubt, but the fact that HSA doesn’t know what kind of visas these workers was using is a very revealing detail.Call me cynical, but when you combine details like this with the fact that our borders are wide open, the only conclusion I can come to is that the “terrorist threat” is completely bogus.
As for the rest of it, I think it’s pretty obvious that our government is colluding with the private sector to loot the country.
Posted by Spengler at 8:19 PM on February 4
“Cinram—which describes itself as the world’s largest maker of pre-recorded multimedia products—said it turned to foreign workers because the area job market couldn’t fill its needs.”
This was reported on several stations. Everybody talking about it was amazed that these people had to go all the way to Nepal to get workers, when there are hundreds they could have hired in Alabama. One person suggested that if Alabama didn’t have workers, wouldn’t Cleveland be a lot closer than Nepal to get others.
This, of course, is another case of corporate greed mongers bringing in low wage workers to satisfy their greed, not caring one iota that they’re destroying our country with misfits.
Whoever writes of this period in history 500 years from now, will determine that whites destroyed themselves by putting votes and money over racial and national loyalty.
Posted by Robert Kelly at 8:41 PM on February 4
Oh really? It could not be do to a tip they received fromt the immegration service so no one would be they when they arrived. The Federal government is not motivated to do anything about these law breakers. Minorities chasing minorities, I do not think so.
Posted by the Soviet Republic of New Jersey at 8:51 PM on February 4
“Reports last fall said Cinram had hired about 1,350 foreign workers to package DVDs at its plant in Huntsville. Cinram—which describes itself as the world’s largest maker of pre-recorded multimedia products—said it turned to foreign workers because the area job market couldn’t fill its needs.”
Alabama has plenty of workers to do these jobs. The problem is that they’re being paid not to work.
If we can’t even stop Nepalese from getting to our country what chance to we have against the mexicans?
Posted by Flamethrower at 9:02 PM on February 4
How much was the company paying these employees/freeloaders? Any comments on company about their “employees” ripping off the landlords and can they be held accountable for their behavior? Homeland InSecurity is a joke.
Posted by JAM at 7:24 AM on February 5
I would like to know what kind of substandard wage the workers were getting because I bet if you refuse to pay even a break even wage to immigrant workers they will leave in search of better opportunities. Maybe now the pornography dispensers will have to hire locals and I’ll bet the reason for the worker shortage is that the company packages porn and the owners don’t want the locals to know about it. I’m gonna google this company.
Posted by pat at 10:12 AM on February 5
They went to Mexico to do the jobs Mexicans won’t do.
Posted by Kellie at 11:27 AM on February 5
A company in the town of Brooks, Alberta, in southern Canada, purposely recruited persons from overseas, in particular Muslims from Somalia and the Sudan. I guess it figured it was cheaper than hiring any of the local indigenous (i.e., white) citizens. Brooks has changed considerably. Needless to say, not for the better. Need I say more?
Posted by Matt at 1:12 PM on February 5
How can the people of Nepal afford to fly to Alabama?
I can barely afford that type of flight. And of course they easily got through customs but the government doesn’t have a clue.
Now they are saying they flew back home which translated means the government isn’t going to bother to look for them.
Posted by Dennis at 1:53 PM on February 5
Good point Dennis - Travelocity says the cheapest flight one can book to Nepal from say, Atlanta, is $1,100, with amounts double and triple that being more common. Not that bad, actually. As for what’s the annual per capita income in Nepal? What would you know - $1,100!
Another point might be to ask how this company located 100 people in Nepal, one of the most remote and isolated countries in the world - truly on the other side of the globe - to work in Huntsville. 100 million Mexicans right across the border were not enough??
Posted by Dave at 6:38 PM on February 5
‘Feds don’t know how they got here in the first place’?
(What a surprise!)
missing? (more like, living freer than any of us would want to)
Posted by GAonMYmind at 7:54 PM on February 5
“First, you’ve got this company importing all these foreign workers “to meet its needs” for cheap labor. The company must have laid them all off after they squeezed the last amount of work out of them because the company’s HR department didn’t know what had happened to them. Disposable wage-slaves. That’s what they were. Use them and forget them. You’d think that controls on foreign guest-workers would be more stringent considering the War On Terror and all. Apparently not…”
Wage slaves, indeed. If they even bothered to pay them. It’s not unheard of to hire these people, work them to the bone, then have them deported the day before payday.
As to how they got here: They probably smuggled them in a cargo container or containers. Maybe the slavemasters loaded them into another container and smuggled them into Canada (Cinram, Inc’s home country per Wikipedia).
Posted by Wild Eyed Charlie at 9:22 PM on February 5
Cinram… Ivy Hill… take the word of someone who has actually handled physically their checks: THEY MAKE ONE HELL OF A PROFIT.
When they say they “need” to hire foreigners, they are LYING THROUGH THEIR TEETH.
Posted by at 9:48 PM on February 5
Maybe the real reason, those hundred Nepalese were brought in, is that the government wanted a company of Gurkhas in the US for things American troops wouldn’t do….
Posted by at 12:48 AM on February 6
Matt,
The company “Lakeside Feeders” is an American company.
Any white person living in Brooks better leave while they still can get something for their property.
Same rule applies everywhere. When there is knowledge that they are coming time to put up the for sale sign.
Of course in time there will not be anywhere to go.
Posted by at 11:24 AM on February 6
If the Human Resources directors of the companies who hire imported aliens over American nationals were to collectively suffer an untimely demise they would be immediately replaced by born again “Americans First” advocates who would welcome American nationals back to the workplace with open arms…
Posted by at 12:24 PM on February 6
The “need to hire foreigners”, a big-business promulgated lie, is probably the worst lying and deliberate deceit against the American People since the web of lies about the 9/11 Events or the infamous attack on the U.S.S. Liberty on June 8, 1967 by a supposed ally.
Posted by Fed Up at 1:40 PM on February 6
If an American firm can’t survive or turn a reasonable profit USING AMERICAN WORKERS DOING THE WORK ON AMERICAN SOIL, it does not deserve to stay in business! Any questions?
Admittedly, neither OUTSOURCING JOBS to other countries, or the fear of my job taken by an immigrant — does not affect me personally. But as a loyal and patriotic American Citizen and voter, this rehprehensible practice by American firms angers me beyond belief. The “bottom line” being these corporations and business are trading the future of our American people for the sake of a quick, short-term profit! So doing incalculable harm to our Nation in the long term.
Posted by Fed Up at 1:47 PM on February 6
If an American firm can’t survive or turn a reasonable profit USING AMERICAN WORKERS DOING THE WORK ON AMERICAN SOIL, it does not deserve to stay in business!
And I wonder the same thing. The media reports coming out of Alabama state the Cinram hired over 1,100 “guest workers” at its plant there. Were there any Americans even working there at all?
And Cinram isn’t even an American company, so the profits aren’t staying here, either - they’re going to Canada.
And if this single company can get 1,100 “guest workers,” just exactly how many guest workers are milling about in this country? They were paying these guys $8 an hour.
Posted by Alan at 10:47 PM on February 17