Competitors suing those hiring illegals

AP/Washington Times:

Business owners frustrated by lax enforcement of immigration laws are taking their fight to court, accusing competitors of hiring illegal workers to achieve an unfair advantage.
The legal action is an attempt by business and anti-illegal-immigration groups to create an economic deterrent against hiring illegal employees.
In the first of a series of lawsuits, a temporary employment agency that supplies farm workers sued a grower and two competing companies on Monday.
Similar cases claiming violations of federal anti-racketeering laws have yielded mixed results. The California lawsuit is thought to be the first based on a state's unfair-competition laws, legal analysts said.
Santa Monica, Calif.-based Global Horizons claimed in the lawsuit that Munger Brothers, a grower, hired illegal alien workers from Ayala Agricultural Services and J&A Contractors. All the defendants are based in California's farm-rich Central Valley.
The suit claims that Munger Brothers had a contract with Global Horizons to provide more than 600 blueberry pickers this spring, but nixed the agreement so it could hire illegal aliens.
"Competitors hiring illegal immigrants is hurting our business badly," Global Horizons President Mordechai Orian said. "It's to the point that doing business legally isn't worth it."
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If our immigration system was working like it should these suits would not be necessary. Doesn't it make more sense to just pick up the phone and call Immigration and Customs Enforcement and tell them where to find the people who are working int he country illegally? Right now the perception is that such a phone call would not lead to any activity. With the millions who are working here illegally only 1,145 were arrested last year for working illegally, which was actually down from the 1999 total of 2,849. With that kind of enforcement effort the odds certainly favor working here illegally.