Welcome to Annexia - Feds’ push to seize restaurant a rare one

[bridgit]

'Illegal workers at heart of French Gourmet case

Sunday, April 25, 2010 at 12:04 a.m.

For more than three decades, The French Gourmet restaurant has been serving high-end cuisine in its 45-seat dining room, catering events across the county, and producing hundreds of wedding cakes annually.

But now the business on Turquoise Avenue in Pacific Beach finds itself the target of federal immigration authorities and prosecutors who want more than just a great Coquille St. Jacques or strawberry bagatelle cake.

In an indictment released last week, the government said it wants the property where the iconic restaurant has done business since 1979.

That move makes the case against The French Gourmet more than a simple immigration enforcement case. Prosecutors could have several reasons for seeking the property, legal experts said. They may want to make a prominent example of the restaurant as they pursue businesses that hire illegal workers. Or perhaps they want to increase the stakes and the pressure to get guilty pleas

“Of course I’m concerned,” he (Malécot) said. “We’ve worked for so many years on that property.”

The indictment is in one sense the latest example of a stepped-up effort by the Obama administration to attack illegal immigration by cracking down on the employers who hire them. Several high-profile cases, including one in Maryland and another in Illinois, targeted restaurants, an industry that historically has been a magnet for illegal workers.'

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/apr/25/feds-push-to-seize-restaurant-a-rare-one/