Topeka ? A couple who pleaded guilty to conspiring to bring illegal foreign workers to the United States will be deported, a U.S. district judge said.

Petrus J. Botes, 50, and Joyce Yvonne Coetzee, 39, will be turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials after a hearing before Judge Sam A. Crow in Topeka.

Botes, a South African businessman, and Coetzee have been in custody since being arrested June 2. They were indicted on three counts of encouraging an illegal alien to reside in the U.S.

According to Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, the couple formed P.J. Services in Bennington, where they fraudulently acted as an agent to employers interested in obtaining foreign workers for agricultural and trucking operations.

“They operated their business with no regard for the workers, the employers or the laws involved,” said Elissa Brown, special agent-in-charge of the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement Chicago office.