updated article:
http://www.philly.com/philly/business/ho...

Mace lawyer gets probation in illegal-worker case

federal judge today sentenced Robert Kramer, the general counsel and a top executive at Mace Security International Inc., to one year's probation and six months of home confinement for his role in hiring dozens of illegal Mexican workers at the company's Philadelphia-area car washes.

Judge C. Darnell Jones II also ordered Kramer to pay a $75,000 fine and to speak to Philadelphia-area law students on professional and corporate responsibility.

Public remorse could be as effective as prison, Jones said.

Kramer faced a maximum six months in prison for his guilty plea in June to one criminal misdemeanor charge of engaging in a pattern of employing at least 50 illegal immigrants.

Kramer didn't admit to actually knowing of the scheme, which spanned several years, to employ undocumented Mexican workers at Mace car washes in Bryn Mawr, Norristown, Flourtown and Cherry Hill. But he admitted that he should have known, because he was the chief operating officer in the car wash division. "I can't adequately express my mortification," Kramer told the judge.

On the day that federal immigration and labor investigators raided the car washes in March 2006, the outlets employed 50 illegal Mexican workers.

Former car wash regional manager Nicholas Sama was sentenced on Thursday to five years' probation, with nine months of home confinement, for his role in the illegal worker scheme. Sama reported to Kramer and said at his sentencing that he had informed Kramer of the illegal workers.

Kramer remains employed at Mace, which is based in Horsham and best known for its defensive pepper spray. Jones said Kramer had to use his own money, and not Mace funds, to pay the $75,000 fine. Even in home confinement Kramer can travel for work and to visit his elderly parents in New Jersey but not to go on vacation, the judge said