Can We Eat THIS Meat of the "People of the Book"?

After Iowa Raid, Immigrants Fuel Labor Inquiries

POSTVILLE, Iowa — When federal immigration agents raided the kosher meatpacking plant here in May and rounded up 389 illegal immigrants, they found more than 20 under-age workers, some as young as 13.

Now those young immigrants have begun to tell investigators about their jobs. Some said they worked shifts of 12 hours or more, wielding razor-edged knives and saws to slice freshly killed beef. Some worked through the night, sometimes six nights a week.

One, a Guatemalan named Elmer L. who said he was 16 when he started working on the plant’s killing floors, said he worked 17-hour shifts, six days a week. In an affidavit, he said he was constantly tired and did not have time to do anything but work and sleep. “I was very sad,” he said, “and I felt like I was a slave.”

At first, labor officials said the raid had disrupted federal and state investigations already under way at Agriprocessors Inc., the nation’s largest kosher plant. The raid has drawn criticism for what some see as harsh tactics against the immigrants, with little action taken against their employers.

But in the aftermath of the arrests, labor investigators have reaped a bounty of new evidence from the testimony of illegal immigrants, teenagers and adults, who were caught in the raid. In formal declarations, immigrants have described pervasive labor violations at the plant, testimony that could result in criminal charges for Agriprocessors executives, labor law experts said.

Out of work and facing deportation proceedings, many of the immigrants say they now have nothing to lose in speaking up about the conditions in the plant. They have told investigators that they were routinely put to work without safety training and were forced to work long shifts without overtime or rest time. Under-age workers said their bosses knew how young they were.

Because of the dangers of the work, it is illegal in Iowa for a company to employ anyone under 18 on the floor of a meatpacking plant.

In a statement, Agriprocessors said it did not employ workers under 18, and would fire any under-age worker found to have presented false documents to obtain work.

To investigate the child labor accusations, the federal Labor Department has joined with the Iowa Division of Labor Services in cooperation with the state attorney general’s office, officials for the three agencies said.

Sonia Parras Konrad, an immigration lawyer in private practice in Des Moines, is representing many of the young workers. She said she had so far identified 27 workers under 18 who were employed in the packing areas of the plant, most of them illegal immigrants from Guatemala, including some who were not arrested in the raid.

“Some of these boys don’t even shave,” Ms. Parras Konrad said. “They’re goofy. They’re teenagers.”

At a meeting here Saturday, three members of the House Hispanic Caucus — including its chairman, Representative Luis V. Gutierrez, Democrat of Illinois — heard seven immigrant minors describe working in the Agriprocessors plant.

Iowa labor officials said they rarely encounter child labor cases even though the state has many meatpacking plants.

“We don’t normally have many under-age folks working in our state,” said Gail Sheridan-Lucht, a lawyer for the state labor department, who said she could not comment specifically on the Agriprocessors investigation.

Other investigations are also under way. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is examining accusations of sexual harassment of women at the plant. Lawyers for the immigrants are preparing a suit under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act for wage and hour violations.

Federal justice and immigration officials, speaking on Thursday at a hearing in Washington of the House Judiciary immigration subcommittee, said their investigations were continuing. A federal grand jury in Cedar Rapids is hearing evidence.

While federal prosecutors are primarily focusing on immigration charges, they may also be looking into labor violations. Search warrant documents filed in court before the raid, which was May 12, cited a report by an anonymous immigrant who was sent to work in the plant by immigration authorities as an undercover informant. The immigrant saw “a rabbi who was calling employees derogatory names and throwing meat at employees.” Jewish managers oversee the slaughtering and processing of meat at Agriprocessors to ensure kosher standards.

In another episode, the informant said a floor supervisor had blindfolded an immigrant with duct tape. “The floor supervisor then took one of the meat hooks and hit the Guatemalan with it,” the informant said, adding that the blow did not cause “serious injuries.”

Source: NY Times

Food for thought: given the work conditions the employees at this Kosher meat packing plant were subjected to, would it still be permissible to eat this meat of the "people of the book"? And even were it permissible, would it not still be preferable to avoid it?

Food Update

Frito-Lay
Earlier this month, Frito-Lay updated their website. Check this out for a list of their products that are free of "porcine enzymes." The products listed are essentially free of ingredients derived from pork, not all animals. So if you are a Zabihah adherent, this information is of no use to you!

(Please note: certain favorites like the Flaming Hot Cheetos are NOT on the pork free list. So make sure to read carefully.)

Masterfoods

"Some of the UK's best-selling chocolate bars, such as Mars and Twix, will no longer be suitable for vegetarians.

Also affecting brands such as Snickers and Maltesers, owner Masterfoods said it had started to use animal product rennet to make its chocolate products.
. . .
Masterfoods said it had started using rennet from 1 May and non-affected products had a "best before date" up to 1 October."

Read on at: BBC News - Mars Starts Using Animal Products

United States Commission on Civil Rights- Religious Accomadation for Muslim Inmates in California Facilities

Muslims in the Federal, State and Local Prison Facility



By Affad Shaikh

The following is a summary of testimony that was presented on Friday March 23, 2006 to the California State Advisory Committee, by me on the "State of Muslim Inmates Incarcerated in California Prisons". By providing this to you, I hope that it will help in trying to motivate our community to communicate, interact and actively volunteer to help our brothers and sisters who are incarcerated.

Thank you for this opportunity to present the state of affair for Muslim inmates incarcerated in California facilities. I am proud to be presenting this because it allows me to voice concern for the many Muslims inmates who have reported incidents to us.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is a ...

CAIR's Civil Rights Department counsels, mediates and advocates on behalf of Muslims and others who have experienced religious discrimination, defamation or hate crimes. The department works to protect and defend the constitutional rights of American Muslims, thereby supporting the rights of all Americans.

Each year CAIR publishes a Civil Rights report outlining the status of American Muslims Civil Rights. I took the liberty of pulling some statistics relevant to our discussion today.

Nationally CAIR has seen a 7% increase in the total number of cases reported to our 32 offices across the United States. Prison cases in 2006, represented the 3rd highest reported category. These generally fall under issues involving religious accommodation for inmates, employees as well as visitors.

Our California offices- Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, and Los Angeles Area- have similar statistic's of cases reported from California's facilities. It is important to remember that the Federal Bureau of Prisons estimates that there are more then 5% of the prison population is Muslim. The majority of these inmates become Muslim while incarcerated.

CAIR is in the business of handling reports of cases and incidents, as such I am speaking specifically regarding the reports we receive, and this does not preclude that we have not seen or felt that positives steps have been taken at these facilities by prison officials.

Islam and Muslim Practices Pertinent to Incarcerated Muslims- brief overview.

I have to admit that the report that my survey of our four chapter presents a frustrated experience with trying to adjudicate these cases. The following is a conclusion we have received from many facilities we have asked to investigate cases or incidents:

"After conducting a thorough investigation, we reach the conclusion that there was no violation of inmate's rights"

You can imagine, how as community advocates this is a frustrating situation.

Muslim inmates report of being denied access to Muslim chaplains or not being informed of religious services. We have also had reports of Muslims not being allowed to pray Friday Congregational prayers. Muslim chaplains report to us that Muslims in the prisons are constantly trying to establish prayer, and in one persons words- "fighting to pray and don't have time to try to get halaal meals".

Dietary requirements for Muslims are a significant number of cases reported to us. In one instance we were informed that Muslim inmates were being forced to eat Pork because of a lack of dietary choices. In another incident, Muslim inmates report of being fed Pork while being told or seeing labels stating "Turkey". Prisoners complain that kosher meals are often provided, however, their dietary needs are not provided for. We encounter funding as an issue affecting the decision to provide hallal meat. Where there are large Muslim populations, these efforts have been possible but have however, ended with funding problems.

Receiving hard copies of the Quran or packages of soft cover reading material have on numerous occasions been returned to vendors and volunteer community organizations with no explanations. There have been cases of Quran's being found torn as a form of retaliation against Muslim inmates.

In other instances Muslim holidays are not recognized by prison officials- there are two critical holidays. One celebrating the end of Ramadan, the other celebrating the completion of the fifth pillar of Islam, and is celebrated by all Muslims.

Other issues include Muslim women who wear the hijab who are forced to remove the hijab. This includes visitors as well as Muslim women inmates. Increasingly, this is an issue that has arisen with Immigration Detention facilities- where there is also a complete lack of accountability in these facilities to religious accommodation, and these also include "for profit" facilities.

In conclusion, these facilities are difficult environments and we understand the desire and need to have a secure environment maintained by Peace Officers. There is policy that exists an is in place, and we have seen that there is a great deal of commitment to these policies from facility officials. However, from our experience with these cases have proven to be difficult in producing results that balance the security needs and the established Constitutional rights of incarcerated Muslims. I feel that Muslim inmates have religious accommodation as mandated by the policy, however, it is a constant challenge to safeguard and to uphold those practices.