DeKalb Resident Sentenced to Three Years in Federal Prison for Bringing Undocumented Workers to the U.S. for Private Financial Gain

ROCKFORD — A DeKalb, Ill., resident was sentenced today to three years in federal prison for bringing undocumented workers to the United States for commercial advantage and private financial gain.  

U.S. District Judge Philip G. Reinhard imposed the sentence on LUIS ALFREDO DELACRUZ, 53, after a hearing in federal court in Rockford.

The sentence was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; and R. Sean Fitzgerald, Acting Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago Office of Homeland Security Investigations.  The DeKalb Police Department assisted in the investigation.  The government was represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Vincenza Tomlinson.

Delacruz admitted in a plea agreement earlier this year that on Nov. 1, 2015, he knowingly brought an alien to the U.S. to work at Delacruz’s business, Alfredo’s Iron Works in Cortland, Ill.   Delacruz admitted that he paid a smuggling fee to another individual to bring the worker into the country.  Once the worker started working for Delacruz’s business, Delacruz deducted the smuggling fee from the worker’s paychecks, referring to it as an “employee loan repayment.” 

Investigating agents who executed a search warrant at Delacruz’s business found in a desk drawer fraudulent identification documents for an additional ten undocumented workers.  In all, Delacruz admitted that he smuggled at least two people into the U.S. on at least four separate occasions.