Two employees of the Colt Grill restaurants in northern Arizona face sentencing in June after admitting their role in the hiring and harboring of dozens of undocumented workers at four Colt Grill eateries in Yavapai County and one in Foley, Alabama.
Luis Pedro Rogel-Jaimes and Iris Cristal Romero-Molina each pleaded guilty in April to a misdemeanor charge of a pattern and practice of hiring undocumented workers and a felony charge of conspiracy to harbor undocumented immigrants, court documents filed in U.S. District Court of Arizona in Phoenix show.
Rogel-Jaimes is scheduled to be sentenced on June 15. Romero-Molina is scheduled to be sentenced on June 22, court documents show.
As part of a plea agreement, they each face a sentence of 12 months in prison. Both are undocumented immigrants from Mexico. They have remained in federal custody since the date of their arrests, court documents show. By pleading guilty to the crimes, they also face automatic deportation to Mexico, according to court documents.
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Before the immigration raid, the pair lived together in a residence in Cottonwood, according to the indictment. Rogel-Jaimes was 33 on July 15, 2025, the date of his arrest. Romero-Molina was 29, federal prosecutors said.
Rogel-Jaimes and Romero-Molina were arrested on July 15, 2025, during a large-scale operation carried out by federal immigration enforcement officers at the four Colt Grill, BBQ and Spirits restaurants in Prescott, Prescott Valley, Sedona and Cottonwood and at a fifth Colt Grill location in Foley, Alabama.
Colt Grill, BBQ and Spirts in Old Town Cottonwood was a popular restaurant known for slow-smoked meats.
The restaurants are owned by husband and wife Robert and Brenda Clouston, who are co-defendants, court documents show. The Cloustons have pleaded not guilty to charges in connection with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid. Their trial is scheduled for Nov. 10.
Rogel-Jaimes and Romero-Molina admitted that along with co-defendants, agreed to create and operate a fake cleaning company called "R&R Az Cleaning" as a way to pay for undocumented workers at the five Colt Grill restaurant locations, according to their plea agreements. The undocumented workers worked as cooks, bussers, kitchen staff and pitmasters, according to the plea agreements.
Colt Grill funds paid R&R Cleaning for the undocumented workers' wages. Any cleaning done by the workers was the daily and usual part of the restaurant employees' duties. They were not full-time cleaners employed by R&R Cleaning solely for cleaning. R&R Cleaning did not do any cleaning services for any other business or company, according to the plea agreements.
Rogel-Jaimes and Romero-Molina admitted that beginning on an unknown date, but at least as of Sept. 27, 2022, when R&R AZ Cleaning was formed, until July 15, 2025, they engaged in a "pattern and practice" of hiring undocumented immigrants to work at the Colt Grill restaurants through R&R AZ Cleaning, according to the plea agreements.
The pair admitted they hired at least 66 undocumented immigrants to work at the Gold Grill restaurants through R&R AZ Cleaning, according to the plea agreements.
Rogel-Jaimes and Romero-Molina admitted that they knew the workers were not authorized to work in the United States and did not deduct appropriate taxes from their paychecks and did not pay them overtime.
The pair also admitted that they fired or caused to resign and quit U.S. citizens so that they could employ the unauthorized workers because of the financial benefit to themselves and co-defendants, the plea agreements said.
The pair admitted that they entered into an agreement with co-defendants and others to conceal, harbor, or shield from detection undocumented immigrants at various houses in Arizona and Foley, Alabama, the plea agreements show.
One of the undocumented workers named in the document lived in a house in Sedona, and two others lived in a house in Prescott where Robert Clouston allegedly paid the rent, according to the plea agreements.
Another undocumented worker lived in an apartment above the Colt Grill in Foley, Alabama, according to the plea agreements.
