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Employment Agency Owner Sentenced

April 25, 2011

A staffing agency owner — Pili Chen, 56, of Norcross, Ga. — was sentenced to one year and four months in prison last week in a federal court in Georgia for recruiting and employing illegal aliens, the FBI reported.

The sentencing follows others in January and early April in related cases of owners and operators of area employment agencies and a Chinese restaurant in the Atlanta area.

Chen’s co-defendant and wife, Xiao Ping Li, fled to Canada after the indictment and remains a fugitive, according to the FBI.

Pili Chen and co-defendant Xiao Ping Li owned and operated New Fuzhou, an employment agency in Chamblee, Ga., according to the FBI. The agency obtained employment for illegal aliens, primarily undocumented Mexican workers, across the eastern United States, usually in Chinese restaurants, according to the agency.

The case was part of a larger operation in June 2010 that involved the separate indictments of the owners and drivers of four employment agencies and the administrative arrests of 39 illegal aliens associated with the agencies and restaurants.