Pardoned auto shop owner freed after rare government reversal

A day after Fong Khang received a pardon from the state of Minnesota, his mug shot landed on a federal website touting “More Worst of Worst” arrests, packaged between photos of two convicted murderers and two sex offenders.

Khang was freed Jan. 28, after seven days in detention, when federal officials deviated from their usual practice and agreed to support his wrongful detention case.

Still, Khang is haunted by that grim portrayal, which he and his supporters don’t believe fits a man convicted of four nonviolent felonies, the most recent of which took place more than 15 years ago.

“It was just horrible,” said Khang, better known in the Twin Cities by his adopted name, John Wayne Pha. “When some of my friends saw that, they were like: ‘Who is this guy? Is this true?’”

Khang is the first to admit he was no angel when he was young. But he doesn’t understand why the government picked on him, a man described by local prosecutors as a model of rehabilitation who became a successful businessman with a client list that includes CEOs and NBA stars. A refugee from Laos, he became a legal permanent resident in 1983

“I’m not an illegal,” said Khang, who came to the U.S. with his mother and two older siblings at the age of one. “I’m an American. I feel like I really belong here.”

As an immigrant with a criminal record, Khang has been at risk for deportation. In 2008, the federal government ordered that he be removed from the country because of his criminal past. That order was unfulfilled due to Laos’ refusal to accept deportees at the time.

Still, he has been looking over his shoulder as President Donald Trump has attempted to make good on his promise to carry out the “largest deportation” in American history.

That’s why Khang went to the Minnesota Board of Pardons last year seeking clemency, which is difficult to obtain. His successful petition drew support from four law enforcement officials, including Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty, who called him a “tremendous example for turning one’s life around.”

Khang, who now owns two auto shops in the Twin Cities area, drew his first criminal citation for speeding at 17. He lost his license when he couldn’t pay the $95 ticket, he said, but he kept driving anyway, using a friend’s name whenever he got pulled over by police. That resulted in three convictions for giving false information to police.

His real problems began in his 20s, when he got hooked on drugs and began stealing to support himself. His first felony conviction occurred in 2006, when he was caught stealing a computer in Fridley. He racked up three more theft convictions in 2007 and his fourth and final felony conviction — for receiving stolen property — in 2010.

Nobody was physically injured or threatened with violence in any of the crimes, according to a review of police reports. Khang received probation for each of his offenses and spent a total of 568 days in jail or the workhouse.

“It was hard to get a job because of my track record, so I got a job at a recycling place, where I drove a forklift for a year,” Khang recalled. “Then I got a job as a mechanic.”

Khang, who became obsessed with cars while growing up in southern California, started his own car repair business in 2016, after the fourth of his four daughters was born. He said it was part inspiration, part desperation.

“My wife and I realized we couldn’t both have jobs anymore, not when someone had to work the night shift and someone else had to work the day shift,” he said.

Khang took their life savings of $30,000 and put it all into Budget Auto Repair in New Brighton. Within three months, he was earning as much as he and his wife had made together. He began hiring employees and the business continued to grow. After four years, he opened a second shop, JWP Automotive, in St. Paul.

The new shop allowed Khang to chase a new market, automotive enthusiasts willing to spend up as much as $100,000 to fix up classic American sports cars. The vehicles sometimes spend as long as a year on the shop floor, where they are typically upgraded with custom-built engines that produce three to five times the power of the original engine. It’s not unusual for a single car to require 200 to 300 hours of labor.

He’s also concerned for his fellow Hmong immigrants, especially those from Laos who came here to escape reprisals for helping Americans during the Vietnam War.

“We didn’t bleed for you here, we bled for you there,” said Khang, whose family changed its name from Pha because his father was a well-known commander who helped American troops during the war.

Khang said there were no warning signs that immigration authorities were looking for him before he was detained on Jan. 21. If they wanted to take him in, he said, why didn’t they do it at his last check-in visit on Dec. 23? Instead, Khang said, two immigration agents stopped him on the way to work, forcing him to abandon his car on the side of the highway.

He was initially detained at the Whipple Building near Fort Snelling, where a federal official tried to speak with him in Spanish.

“I said, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t speak Spanish,” Khang recalled. “And she looked at the ICE officer and said, ‘Make sure he gets sent to his country.’ And I was like, ‘Whoa!’ ”

“I just felt like we were cattle,” Khang said.

Once in Texas he was moved to a cramped detention center. There he shared a makeshift cell with 100 other men for two days. Altogether, he said, there were 10 cells, all clustered under a giant tent.

There was one phone for the entire group of 1,000 detainees, who were permitted to talk for no more than five minutes per call. It could take four days for that phone to make the rounds, Khang said.

“I never saw the phone while I was there,” Khang said. “My wife was really scared.”

Khang was returned to Minnesota, where he sat in a jail cell for another five days until the government set him free.

Officials from the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to questions about the case.

Khang’s lawyer, Mai Moua, argued in court filings that the government never had a right to detain him because his pardon extinguished any grounds for deportation.

Khang said he hopes federal officials make it easier for people with active immigration cases to turn themselves in instead of putting them through the ordeal of a public arrest. In some cases, records show, federal agents have broken into homes and smashed car windows in order to take an immigrant into custody.