About one-third of the employees of Agriprocessors Inc. in Postville, Iowa were detained in a raid Monday by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

More than 300 workers at the nation's largest kosher meat processing facility had been processed and arrested by late Monday afternoon, charged with administrative immigration violations, ICE spokesman Tim Counts told Meatingplace. The number is expected to increase, however.

The agents executed a criminal search warrant for evidence relating to aggravated identity theft, fraudulent use of Social Security numbers and other crimes, Counts said. The agency also had a civil search warrant for people illegally in the United States.

Once the paperwork is finished, those detainees who are found to have violated immigration laws will begin the deportation process, which will include the opportunity for a hearing before an immigration judge if they wish to argue their case.

Local immigration activists had gotten wind of a possible ICE raid in the area, according to an Associated Press account from Monday. Federal agents had leased the National Cattle Congress fairgrounds in that town until late May, and indeed Counts said that is where the men picked up in the raid in Postville will stay until their cases are completed. The women who worked at Agriprocessors will be housed in local jails with which ICE has contracts.