Postville Saga Continues, Latest Batch of Disgusted Workers Leaves, New CEO Charges

"Agriprocessors is again losing a significant part of its workforce, but this time it's not because of an immigration raid. The meat packing plant recently hired more than 150 workers from Palau, a small island nation in the Pacific Ocean. But this weekend, the majority of those workers left, saying what they expected in Postville was far from what they found there," KCRG reports.

"The workers arrived in September on the promise from Palauan recruiters of cheap rent and decent wages, despite letters of warning from union leaders and residents. Most expressed anger at Agriprocessors, but also at its government for allowing them to make the exhausting and expensive 72-hour trip by plane and bus to a doomed situation. When Hersey Kyoto, Palauan ambassador to the U.S., arrived in Postville Friday, his countrymen had just found out they would not be paid for the most recent two weeks of work, and some had their electricity cut off," The Courier writes.

"At an initial appearance Friday on new charges of bank fraud, [former CEO] Rubashkin, 49, was ordered by Magistrate Judge Jon Scoles to be held until a detention hearing Wednesday. It appears Rubashkin faces a significant chance of being denied bail at that hearing," The Gazette reports.