After Immigration Raids Link Restaurants Closed After ICE Raids Mambo's Headquarters Raided First POSTED: Wednesday, December 2, 2009 UPDATED: 3:42 pm CST December 2, 2009 HOUSTON -- Several well-known Houston restaurants were closed on Wednesday after immigration agents made dozens of arrests, KPRC Local 2 reported. Officials said the investigation began at the corporate office and an adjacent restaurant of Mambo's Restaurants, located in the 6100 block of Airline. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents raided the buildings at about 9 a.m. A government spokesman said they executed a court order to enforce immigration statutes and detained workers the government claimed are in the U.S. illegally. At the same time, a second group of agents raided the Mambo's restaurant on Longpoint near Gessner Road in Spring Branch and detained workers there. A total of 31 allegedly illegal immigrants were taken from the two locations. By Wednesday afternoon, Mambo's appeared to have closed all five of its Houston restaurants. Despite repeated calls, none of Mambo's corporate executives have been available for comment. The restaurant on Long Point is next to a labor agency where illegal immigrants routinely gather in the mornings to look for work. Two men who admitted that they are in this country illegally said the immigration agents simply told them to leave, then the agents went into the restaurant and began arresting employees. "There were a bunch of us here and all immigration said was,'Go across the street.' And that's all they said," said the man who did not want to be identified. "There were between 100 and 150 people standing here, all in different groups. I was here in my car when they came in and they came in with two police and ICE went inside. The police stayed outside," said another man known only as Jose. ICE spokesman Gregory Palmer said the agents were there to execute a court order, and he suspected that there were only enough of them to deal with the illegal workers found in the restaurant.
I wonder if they gathered all the women who can't speak English. I used to eat at the one on longpoint all the time. good micheladas, but Mambo isn't as good as Golden Seafood on Ailrline. Not even close
With unemployment high, the time that companies can say americans are unwilling to do these jobs is gone. Now the illegal immigrants are tossed aside like trash. I will be very interested to hear how much they are fined for hiring them. It is so much more their fault than these poor people.
Agreed. This has always been the arguement here, people aren't willing to do the jobs that these immigrants do. Interesting to see that this will pan out
it won't stop a business like Mambo's from hiring illegals. have you been to a mambo's who's their customer base. part of their hiring practice is who they are catering to
Well this sucks, I actually live there grilled and fried fish along with there fries. Sucks for all those people but not suprising at all, everytime I went in their it was painfully obvious.
i'm saying that mambo's caters to hispanics/latinos, illegal or not. when you go in the flat screen television are showing latin american soccer games. the menus are in English/Spainish and most of the people there are speaking spanish
Well they need to hire the spanish speakers than have a work permit or citizenship. They will do it if the fines are more than the extra salary costs them.
Did you write this on purpose? Learn how to properly use "their" and "there." I hate to go Swoly on you, but you were 0-3 in those two sentences.
everyone's strapped for cash. Govt agencies are hitting it hard, in all aspects. I know we've been tax audited more in the last year than the prior 6 years.
Excuse me???? Just because I like to eat at the place or am currently working so my usage of "there" and "their" isn't as perfect as it should does not make me an illegal but i'll assume it was a bad attempt at humor.
