Project manager of MCC Int’l gets prison term

One of five indicted for allegedly harboring illegal Chinese workers pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge yesterday as part of a plea deal and was slapped with a six-month prison term.

MCC International project manager Yuqing Zhao, 43, was given credit for 12 days of time served.

Zhao pleaded guilty in federal court to unlawful employment of aliens—a misdemeanor charge. The charge of harboring illegal aliens, a felony offense that carries a maximum prison sentence of 10 years, was dropped.

The workers entered the CNMI as tourists but later worked on the Pacific Imperial International CNMI LLC casino resort in Garapan.

After serving his prison term, Zhao will be placed on six months of supervised release. He was ordered to pay an $11,000 fine.

U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona, who presided over the case, said that Zhao, as a guest worker in the CNMI, should respect the laws of the host country.

Manglona said it is a privilege to be in the CNMI to earn a lawful living, but Zhao violated U.S. law.

The judge said that what Zhao committed is a non-violent crime but his unlawful conduct involved a lot of people’s lives and households.

Manglona noted that in the crime that defendant pleaded guilty to involved 15 illegal aliens, but in fact there were 180 reported illegal aliens involved.

Manglona said that a prison term is appropriate.

The judge said the original crime charged against Zhao with a serious felony that carried a maximum prison sentence of 10 years. Zhao should be grateful because someone died at the construction site and that he was not held liable for that, Manglona said.

She said the $11,000 fine imposed on Zhao is the amount that he got from the operation and that she would not allow him to walk away with the money when others suffered.

When Zhao was arrested, authorities recovered $11,000 from him that he reportedly earned during his work with the casino/resort project.

Assistant U.S. attorney Eric O’Malley, who prosecuted the case, said that under the plea agreement, the minimum fine is $10,000 but the $45,000 that is authorized is too high.

O’Malley said the six months contemplated in the plea deal is appropriate and this would send a message to others in Zhao’s position that they have to obey U.S. laws or they have to pay a heavy price.

O’Malley said this is a “big machine operation” and that Zhao’s role is only part of that operation.

O’Malley said Zhao was not involved in the actual recruitment of the workers as his role was pretty much signing checks to make payments possible.

The prosecutor said that, on Aug. 1, 2016, and continuing to March 2017, Zhao hired 15 aliens, but he knew were not authorized to work in the U.S. or in the CNMI.

Zhao, through an interpreter, said he did sign the checks and invoices for payment to aliens who were working illegally.

Attorney Colin Thompson, counsel for Zhao, said the defendant wants to serve the sentence right away and go back to his family in China.

A separate indictment charged Beilida Overseas president Hui Lu and Beilida’s Wencai Guo, Xiufang Qi,and Hongwei Ma with harboring illegal aliens.

The indictment alleges that on March 8 through March 22, 2017, Lu, Guo, and Ma harbored an illegal alien, Yuanyou Hu, who was killed after falling from a scaffold at the construction site of the Imperial Pacific casino and resort project in March 2017.

On Feb. 7 through March 22, 2017, Lu, Guo, Qi, and Ma allegedly harbored six illegal aliens.

MCC International is the construction contractor for Imperial Pacific. Beilida Overseas is among its subcontractors.