Nov 232009
Nearly two years and 26 business raids after the state’s employer-sanctions law took effect, county prosecutors on Wednesday filed the first case against a business owner they say knowingly hired illegal workers. Michelle Hardas, owner of Scottsdale Art Factory, has been named in a civil complaint in Maricopa County Superior Court. 
The complaint alleges she knowingly violated the Legal Arizona Workers Act when, according to prosecutors, she hired a subcontractor who was actually her employee and whom she knew to be in the country illegally. “It’s the first time a case like this has been brought any place in the United States,” County Attorney Andrew Thomas said. “It’s the first time a state law has been used to try to suspend or revoke a business license of an employer who had hired illegal immigrants.”
