Nicole Tipton and Sadik Seferi owned and operated a restaurant in Iowa.   Acting on a tip from the local police, agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement executed search warrants at the restaurant and at an apartment where some restaurant workers lived. The agents discovered six undocumented aliens working at the restaurant and living together. When the I-9 forms for the restaurant’s employees were reviewed, none were found for the six aliens. They were paid in cash, while the other employees were paid by check. Tipton and Seferi were charged with hiring and harboring illegal aliens.

What laws or regulations apply?

What argument would you make that Tipton and Seferi were guilty of hiring and harboring illegal aliens?

What defense could Tipton and Seferi assert that they did not know that the workers were unauthorized aliens?