Huh. Who, if anyone, are the “good guys” in this scenario from Maryland?
A Maryland woman, Karen Travino, has been accused of hiring illegal immigrants to fix her roof, then calling I.C.E. on them to avoid having to pay for the work. Nice.
In the video shot from the roof of the property in Cambridge, Maryland by Bryan Polanco, a worker with legal permanent residency, federal agents are e seen waiting on the lawn in front of the house, ready to arrest Polanco’s co-workers. His voice speaking over the video explains that he and his colleagues had come at teh woman’s request to fix the her roof, then she called ICE to have them taken into custody as soon as they were done, saving herself $10,000. “We came to fix this lady’s house, and she’s the one who turned us in. Fixing up her house and still with hatred in her heart,” Polanco says. “What she did tell me, and I told one of the other guys, is that if immigrants come back again to finish the project, she’s always going to call ICE.”
Six Guatemalan men had driven 70 miles from Glen Burnie to finish the job, being assured that they would be paid.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, said that if the allegations against the homeowner are true, she could face legal consequences under the Maryland law prohibiting the use of immigration threats to obtain labor or avoid payment. I don’t see that in the fact pattern. Pro-illegal immigrant activists are now claiming that Trevino threatened the men, forcing them to do the work for nothing or face deportation. That makes no sense, and seems contrived. I don’t know if there is any law covering what the homeowner did, although it would seem that the workers might have a civil suit for the money owed to them under breach of contract. Being illegal doesn’t cancel out the right to due process and protection under the law.
Who are the “good guys” and “bad guys” in this incident? I believe that a citizen is only being responsible to assist in the apprehension of illegal immigrants: that’s a civic duty. But to deceive vulnerable workers, running a veritable sting—that’s not admirable or ethical is it? Even less admirable is Karen Trevino trying to take advantage of illegal immigrants before blowing the whistle on them.
Good citizen and cheap home-owner Karen is complaining because she is being flamed on social media. I’m tempted to say she deserves it.
Are there any victims here? Are there any people to admire?
Ethics Alarms 
You reference the notion of a “sting operation.” Are Ms. Trevino’s actions categorically different from law-enforcement officers impersonating a fifteen-year-old girl to entrap a sexual predator?…or officers who solicit to bag prostitutes?
The workers in question here are already criminals…even the woman thinking about earning money through illegal sexual activities may not have done so except for the enticement of an undercover police officer.
I hope this makes some sense…I should be sleeping…
She’s not a police officer. She’s more of a vigilante in the style of James O’Keefe without the video camera. If he exposes corruption or criminal activity, it should be investigated and acted upon, but he’s still icky. So is Karen.
I see your point. Maybe there isn’t a very big gap between the notion of “community law enforcement” and “setting up a criminal to fail.”
Ok..another scenario…
Ms. Travino hires people to repair her roof. No illegal aliens are present, but among those who show up to work are individuals whom she knows have outstanding, arrestable warrants.
Is notifying authorities of those individuals also icky? The larger question…at what point does “vigilante-ism” turn icky?
I dunno, Joel. I wish I did. Maybe motivations come into play somewhere? Karen wanted a free roof, after all.
I concur on the motivation being wrong. If a person wants to do his/her duty as a citizen and report crime when it’s observed?…totally good. But an individual manipulating that system to enrich oneself is unethical.
Which I suppose is the entire point of the OP…which I think I lost sight of at 3:15 this morning.
I apologize for wasting your time.
You didn’t. Think nothing of it. You raise important questions, including whether we should even consider motivation.
If you benefit from turning in a criminal who did, in fact, commit a crime, is that unethical? Why offer rewards, for example?
Since it now appears that there may be more to this specific situation than initially reported, I think we should be free to delve into the realm of the hypothetical.
Or maybe I was just really into this discussion because I was celebrating finishing – finally – “The Brothers Karamazov”.
I watched a British drama episode more than ten years ago where the same thing happened, The owner of a large farm had foreign workers do all the harvesting and then called immigration when the job was almost finished so that she would not have to pay them. Maybe Karen Travino watched he same episode.
If she called ICE to avoid paying for her roofing, wouldn’t she have waited until they finished? They hadn’t even begun pulling off the old shingles. The tarps on the ground, meant to collect the debris, are clean. The shingles on the roof are clearly old. It looks like there’s new decking still on the truck.
If anyone called ICE, and it’s not just ICE keeping an eye on construction crews, my money would be on one of the contractors that this guy was able to underbid since he uses cheaper, illegal labor. (Which is also a good reason for the video maker to want to deflect attention from the hiring business to the customer.)
I’ve seen a newer video from ICE of TikTok that tells the same story, but is clearly a mashup of more than one video. Along with the original one with gray shingles, there’s one of men removing brown shingles and then a group removing black shingles. It also says the woman was arrested, but the woman in handcuffs is not the same woman in the photo of the homeowner. (There is no record of an arrest of the woman accused of calling ICE.)
The woman has been doxxed and is being threatened, all because people believe the guy on the roof (how would he know who called?) over their own eyes. He thinks she called ICE because she cooperates with them when they arrive. That was his evidence. He has since deleted the Facebook post that started all of this.
There was another video of him talking to the male homeowner (Trevino’s father). The roofer was accusing the man of being pro-ICE since he did not order them off of his property. The man was saying that although he believes immigrants are hard workers, they need to come here legally and he supports ICE. He also said he does not know who contacted ICE>
DHS denied they were acting on a tip. Bryan Polanco, who made the video and the accusations, needs to be as internet-famous as the woman he falsely accused.
There are a lot of unanswered questions here. Was this her plan or did she find out they were illegal aliens. After work commenced? How would she know they were illegal aliens beforehand? To set up a sting one must know something about the target and given they drive 70 miles to get there it is unlikely that she knew them beforehand.
I once contracted with a roofer who swore all members of the crew were legal workers but I had my doubts when none could speak English.
A 10,000 dollar roof could be installed in one day so I must wonder how she got work done if ICE was waiting for the co-workers to arrive.
Final point. How do you avoid payment if you are dealing with a licensed firm. It seems to me any claims for pay by the workers falls on the employer and the contractor/employer has a claim against the homeowner. The only defense would be if the work contract included language requiring only legal workers. I wonder why Bryan Polanka was not arrested for employing illegal aliens if he was the boss.
The only sources I found for this story was an “oddity” site, a pro-illegal immigration activist site, and Snopes. Someone give me a million bucks to be able to quit writing ethics opinions and do EA right, and this kind of thing won’t happen.
Momma told me that any job worth doing is worth doing right. Good advice, I think.
OTOH, I look at this site for the occasional really difficult ethics situation, and then I’m willing to do some research on my own. Often enough, sharing the results of that research becomes pointless as another half dozen or so issues have been raised and the discussion has moved on.
Skip regularly responded to spoken wishes with some common sense wisdom involving wishing in one hand and …, oh, never mind.
Based on previous comments I assume that it is not an established fact that the call to ICE is made by any of the Travino family. From an ethics perspective that changes everything.
The Travino family is not willing the pay the roof. The reason for this is simple: the contractor did not finish the roof. And that is entirely the fault of the contractor, as he hired illegals to do the work who then got arrested by ICE to be deported.
Did the Travino family have a civic duty to verify the immigration status of all the workers of the side? No, because it is the legal duty of the contractor to make sure that all who work for him have a legal status to work in the USA. The Travino family would be wrong to assume that somebody here is illegal simply based on lack of English language skills; it is called prejudice, and acting on that prejudice is called discrimination.
Would a competing contractor who makes sure that he follows all labor laws and immigration laws be wrong to call ICE on the practices of his competitor who is able to undercut his bids by breaking the law. Of course not! It is commendable to police your industry by reporting the scofflaws; this will raise the ethics standards in that industry. If these standards are not policed, the scofflaws retain a competitive advantage, and will bring down the ethical standards of the entire industry.
Do citizens have an ethical duty to report any violation of immigration laws? I am on the fence on this. There is no legal duty to report. I am still horrified by the snitch lines during the COVID-19 heydays, in order to report your neighbors who were having a party. I am also not going to report my neighbor if I know that he cheats on his taxes. I understand that people in the USA have vastly different opinions about the ethics of illegal immigration; those who are supportive of immigrants regarding status and against ICE will not report as a matter of personal ethics and conscience.
Add to the list of reasons I don’t believe the guy who made the video, the work was being done without the required permit from the city. (They have since gotten the permit, and I believe the work was completed but I can’t find where I read that.)
Scammy contractor doing scammy stuff.
Side note: While many articles mention a price tag of $10k to $20k for a roofing job, the company involved advertises a $3999 roof replacement for roofs under 1400 sq. ft.
Great work, mb.