The owner of a chain of popular Baltimore sushi restaurants who pleaded guilty last year to conspiring to harbor illegal aliens and money laundering earned a five-month prison sentence Wednesday.
U.S. District Judge Catherine Blake ordered Tzu Ming Yang, 49, of Clarksville, to report to federal prison in May. He and his business partner, Jack Chang, 42, also of Clarksville, entered into a plea agreement with the government last April, admitting guilt to harboring between six and 24 undocumented workers and paying them low wages to work at twoBaltimore restaurants, Kawasaki Restaurant at 413 N. Charles St. and Kawasaki Café at 514 S. Chapel St.
“It?s a very difficult social and economic issue,” Blake said. “But there?s a need for deterrence.”
Blake gave Chang 10 months of home detention and Yang?s wife, Jui Fan Lee, 50, two years probation for their lesser roles in housing and employing the undocumented workers, some of whom were crowded in an apartment without running water above one of the restaurants, according to court documents.
Tzu and Jui Yang also operated the Kawasaki at Johns Hopkins Hospital, located at 600 N. Wolfe St.
Yang, who immigrated to the United States in 1974 when he was 16, apologized and said he accepted responsibility for his actions in court Wednesday. He asked Blake for leniency.
“I?m so sorry about what happened,” Yang said. “Please, your honor, allow me to return home so I can take care of my daughter and wife.”
Yang and Chang?s sentences might have been steeper, Blake acknowledged, if they hadn?t forfeited about $386,000 in cash, properties located at 514 S. Chapel St. and 1535 Melton Road, and several luxury vehicles for a total estimated value of more than $1 million.
“[The forfeitures] go a long way in terms of just punishment of the defendants,” Blake said.
