ICE Raid Report

Police: 36 illegal immigrants found in NW Valley house (Tucson Citizen)

2011-11-06T22:48:00.001-05:00

Police: 36 illegal immigrants found in NW Valley house
by Philip Haldiman on Nov. 05, 2011

Thirty-six people suspected of being in the country illegally were found in a northwest Valley home on Saturday, according to Phoenix police.

Officials received an anonymous tip that the residence, in the 2100 block of West Shaw Butte, could be being used as a drop house.

The group is in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

No further information was available.

Benita Veliz, DREAM Act Poster Child, Spared Deportation By Immigration Officials (Huffington Post)

2011-11-06T22:46:00.001-05:00

Benita Veliz, DREAM Act Poster Child, Spared Deportation By Immigration Officials
First Posted: 11/6/11 08:28 AM ET Updated: 11/6/11 11:09 AM ET

Benita Veliz, a poster child for the DREAM Act, was spared deportation earlier this week under deportation guidelines established by the Morton Memo on Prosecutorial Discretion, issued by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement this past June.

After her parents brought her to Texas from Mexico at the age eight, Veliz graduated from high school two years early as a National Merit Scholar and as her class valedictorian. She then graduated from St. Mary's University, which she attended on a full academic merit scholarship. But in 2009, she said a small driving error threatened her ability to stay in the only country she knows.

Veliz neglected to make a complete stop at a stop sign, prompting a police officer to pull her over. Deportation proceedings were then initiated when it was discovered she was undocumented.

In a video testimony on YouTube filmed in 2009, Veliz says that she has "absolutely no family in Mexico" and knows "absolutely no one" in her native country. Veliz says in the video that critics should take into account how young she was when her parents brought her to the U.S.

"A lot of people will take the argument, illegal is illegal is illegal and so if you're here illegally you did something wrong and you need to go back where you came from," she said in the video. "But put yourself in the shoes of an eight-year-old child, who has absolutely no concept of what legal is or illegal is ... who could barely write in cursive, much less understand the complexities of the immigration system."

Luckily for Veliz, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director John Morton established new guidelines earlier this year that prioritized the deportation of undocumented immigrants who are dangerous criminals over that of individuals with no criminal record. Thanks to those guidelines, immigration authorities ended deportation proceedings against Veliz on Wednesday. Nancy Shivers, Veliz's lawyer, said in an interview with the San Antonio Express-News that she believes Veliz was spared because she's eligible for the DREAM Act.

However, Veliz's trouble are still "far from over," according to the San Antonio Express-News, because in order to obtain a work permit, she would have to leave the United States and face a 10-year ban before she could return.

While cases like Veliz's are not yet commonplace, she is not the first to avoid deportation thanks to the Morton memo. Luis Enrique Hernandez and Pedro Morales, two students from Georgia who were brought to the U.S. at a young age, both successfully filed petitions to drop their cases based on the memo's guidelines.

Despite the challenges she still faces, Veliz says she is happy to be able to stay in the country she calls home.

"When this started three years ago, I thought that was it. I'd lost hope," Veliz said to the San Antonio Express-News. "I'm definitely happy to still be here."

Frederick murder case sparks debate about illegal immigration

2011-11-05T21:43:00.001-04:00

Frederick murder case sparks debate about illegal immigration
By Brad Bell
November 4, 2011 - 05:06 pm

The arrest of a suspect in the murder of a Frederick Burger King manager has ignited a debate in Frederick County about illegal immigration.

The suspect arrested by police, 21-year-old Jose Reyes Mejia-Varela, is an illegal immigrant who had already been deported once before.

Federal criminal charges are pending against Mejia-Varela for illegally re-entering the country after having been deported as an aggravated felon, police say. He has also been charged with first-degree murder, armed robbery, first and second-degree assault and theft.

County Commissioner Blaine Young is proposing a package of rules to drive illegal immigrants out of Frederick County.

“What happened was this hit kind of close to home. So we kind of fast-tracked some of those initiatives we want to look at,” Young said.

He wants to strengthen an existing English-language ordinance, require businesses to use a government data base to verify employees’ status, prohibit the rental of homes and apartments to illegal immigrants and prohibit day-labor gathering sites.

“We should not be offering assistance to people that aren't here legally,” Young said.

Some Frederick residents share Young’s sentiment, but others argue the rules go too far.

“Bottom line, if you're an illegal immigrant, you're here illegally. You got to enforce the law,” said John Hardin.

“There’s absolutely a middle ground for finding a way to accept all who come to this country and adhere to our laws,” counters Chris Garcia.

Young predicts the proposals will become law.

“People have said Frederick is the (…) unfriendliest county in the state of Maryland when it comes to illegal aliens. We wear that as a badge of honor,” he said.

US Citizen Caught With Drugs Avoids Prison by Posing as Illegal Immigrant (The Christian Post)

2011-11-05T21:34:00.002-04:00

US Citizen Caught With Drugs Avoids Prison by Posing as Illegal Immigrant
Scenario 'not unusual,' says immigration official

By Ray Downs | Christian Post Reporter

Fri, Nov. 04 2011 11:21 PM EDT

An American citizen who thought deportation would be preferable to incarceration told police that he was an illegal immigrant in order to be sent to Mexico instead of prison – and it worked.

Jaime Alvarado, 27, from Salt Lake City, was arrested in Feb. 2010 for possession of "cocaine and heroin with an intent to distribute," reported ABC News, and told police that he was Saul Quiroz, an illegal immigrant from Mexico.

After pleading guilty, police handed him over to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and instead of the 15-year sentence he would have been given had he been honest about his identity, Alvarado, aka Saul Quiroz, was given a one-way ticket to Mexico.

According to the Daily Mail, Alvarado "exploited" the fact that officials are allegedly more willing to send foreign offenders back to their country instead of trying to fit them into already overcrowded prisons.

Eventually, Alvarado came back to the U.S. under his real name using his American passport. Everything seemed fine until he was re-arrested in April of this year and was about to be sent to the ICE again before he confessed his true, American identity.

Alvarado was then released from prison in June, with everything seeming to be over. However, authorities eventually figured out the ruse and on Oct. 31, issued a warrant for the arrest of the man previously known to Utah authorities as "Saul Quiroz."

This time, however, Alvarado is pleading instead of fleeing in order to avoid hard time.

"I know I made a poor choice by lying to you guys a year ago. I was afraid to go to prison," he wrote in a letter to the judge presiding over his case.

"I have a good job right now, a lot of little girls waiting for me and a family that will support me," he added. "It's my first offense and my last. I want to spend the rest of my life with my kids."

In a separate letter from Alvarado's fiance, Anelia Carballo, said her future husband has made "a 360-degree turnaround" and was a good father to their daughter together as well as her other four girls, ABC News reported.

According to The Associated Press, ICE spokeswoman Lori Haley said it is not rare for American citizens to claim being an illegal immigrant and face deportation in order to avoid going to prison.

Vermont enforce new immigration policy (WNEM-VT)

2011-11-05T21:25:00.002-04:00

Vermont enforce new immigration policy

Posted: Nov 05, 2011 5:36 AM EDT

BURLINGTON, VT (WPTZ/CNN) - Vermont's governor has released a new immigration policy for state police, which is being dubbed the "look the other way" policy.

Gov. Peter Shumlin says state troopers should not try to arrest people just for being in the U.S. illegally.

Back in September, a state trooper made a routine traffic stop and asked one of the passengers his immigration status. He suspected that person of being an illegal immigrant and called Customs and Borders Patrol, who arrested the man.

The arrest sparked protests from the migrant worker community, who says the trooper should never have asked about the man's immigration status.

The governor's office says the trooper did nothing wrong, but Gov. Shumlin said the state's policy was in a gray area that needed clearing up.

"Vermont farmers can't survive without workers from outside America," Shumlin said. "That's just the way it is. We've got to keep our dairy farms strong, so we've always had a policy in Vermont where we kind of "look the other way" as much as we can.

The governor says that immigration is to be enforced by federal agents. State police can choose to help by detaining people they suspect of being illegal immigrants.

"The new policy states that Vermont State Police troopers should not try to identify people whose only suspected violation is that they are present in the United States without proper documentation, but also makes it clear that officers should continue to investigate suspected criminal activity," Shumlin said in a released statement.

In the new policy, Shumlin also recommends federal authorities be called in to help with Canadian border cases.

Macon Police: Alcohol Sweep Turns Up Illegal Immigrant (WMAZ-GA)

2011-11-05T21:23:00.002-04:00

Macon Police: Alcohol Sweep Turns Up Illegal Immigrant
Written by Katelyn Heck
1:53 PM, Nov 5, 2011

The Macon Police Department Narcotics Unit issued several citations and made one arrest after conducting alcohol compliance tests Thursday evening.

Jami Gaudet with the police department says Jograj Singh was arrested for sale of alcohol without a license.

Gaudet says police called Immigration Enforcement after Singh gave them a South Texas correction identification that appeared to be fraudulent. Immigration Enforcement revealed Singh is on bond in New York for illegally entering the United States.

According to Gaudet, six people were cited for the sale of alcohol to a person under the age of 21. Police cited Saeb Saidi, Victor Elias, Syed Ahmed, Kalpesh Patel, Matthew Black, and Lakeshia Reeves.

Thousands of Kids Taken From Parents In U.S. Deportation System (ColorLines)

2011-11-02T11:12:00.003-04:00

Thousands of Kids Taken From Parents In U.S. Deportation System
by Seth Freed Wessler
Wednesday, November 2 2011, 8:00 AM EST

Clara’s eldest kid was 6 years old and her youngest just a year old when it happened. Josefina’s baby was 9 months. All three children were ripped from their mothers and sent to live in foster homes with strangers. Clara and Josefina, sisters in their early 30s who lived together in a small northern New Mexico town, had done nothing to harm their children or to elicit the attention of the child welfare department. Yet one morning last year, their family was shattered when federal immigration authorities detained both sisters. Clara and Josefina were deported four months later. For a year, they had no contact with their children.

The sun was rising on a late summer morning in Farmington. Clara (all parents’ names in this story have been changed) was asleep inside the trailer that she shared with the children and Josefina, who was finishing a night shift at the local restaurant where both sisters worked. Clara says she was jolted awake by the sound of banging and yelling. A group of uniformed officers, some marked with ICE, for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and others DEA, for Drug Enforcement Administration, burst through the door.

The agents put Clara in handcuffs, while two of the officers began walking and carrying the children out of the trailer. Clara pleaded with them, asking what they would do with her children. “We’re taking them where we take all the kids,” Clara remembers one of the agents saying. She begged them to let her call a friend who could come pick up the children. The agents refused.

When Josefina arrived home from work several hours later, ICE officers were waiting. The sisters were locked up in the San Juan County jail, where they stayed for several weeks until ICE transported them to an immigration detention center in Albuquerque, three hours to the south. Their children remained in foster care.

This family is one among thousands who’ve been through the same ordeal. In a yearlong investigation, the Applied Research Center, which publishes Colorlines.com, found that at least 5,100 children whose parents are detained or deported are currently in foster care around the United States. That number represents a conservative estimate of the total, based on extensive surveys of child welfare case workers and attorneys and analysis of national immigration and child welfare trends. Many of the kids may never see their parents again.

These children, many of whom should never have been separated from their parents in the first place, face often insurmountable obstacles to reunifying with their mothers and fathers. Though child welfare departments are required by federal law to reunify children with any parents who are able to provide for the basic safety of their children, detention makes this all but impossible. Then, once parents are deported, families are often separated for long periods. Ultimately, child welfare departments and juvenile courts too often move to terminate the parental rights of deportees and put children up for adoption, rather than attempt to unify the family as they would in other circumstances.

While anecdotal reports have circulated about children lingering in foster care because of a parent’s detention or deportation, our investigation provides the first evidence that the problem occurs on a large scale. If these cases continue mounting at the same pace over the next five years, 15,000 children of detained and deported mothers and fathers will likely be separated from their parents and languish in U.S. foster homes.

Citizen Kids Caught in the Deportation Dragnet

Josefina and Clara’s children are among the hidden victims of an expanding immigration detention and deportation system that now expels nearly 400,000 people each year.

According to Clara and Josefina, the ICE and DEA agents came to their home looking for drugs, but found none. Clara believes a neighbor called in the false report to ICE. A criminal background check confirms that charges against the sisters were dropped and that neither had ever been convicted of any crime. ICE nonetheless detained them because of their undocumented immigration status, moving them from the county jail to the immigration detention center where they were held for three months. They were deported to Mexico in December 2010.

According to over 100 child welfare caseworkers and attorneys we interviewed around the country, as rates of deportations increase, so do the numbers of children from immigrant families in foster care. Indeed, federal data released to the Applied Research Center through a Freedom of Information Act request shows that almost one in four people deported in the last year was the mother or father of a United States citizen. (Next week, Colorlines.com will publish a follow-up story further detailing and explaining this startling data.)

Roberta is one such parent. Almost a year ago, she was arrested on a drunken driving charge that would likely have triggered only a short interruption in her child custody, if she were a citizen. Instead, it threatens to result in the termination of the 35-year-old’s parental rights, because she is an undocumented immigrant and was deported after being charged. Her five young children are now in two different foster homes in Phoenix. Separated from them by the U.S.-Mexico border, Roberta cannot make the journey back to fight for her kids.

ICE detained Roberta after the Phoenix police stopped her one evening as she drove three of her children home from a family party, where Roberta acknowledges she had one beer too many. Police administered a breathalyzer and charged her with driving under the influence and with child endangerment.

“I know I’ve made a mistake, but I’ve never before had a problem and I’ve paid,” Roberta told me in late January 2011, while still at the Eloy Detention Center, a 1,600-bed facility run by the for-profit Corrections Corporation of America. A criminal background check confirms that this was Roberta’s first conviction in her 15 years living in the United States.

Phoenix is one of almost 70 jurisdictions around the country where local police have signed agreements with the federal government to act as immigration agents. The “287(g)” agreement, as the program is called, turns a simple traffic stop into a path to deportation by deputizing local cops as immigration enforcement agents.

Our research found that children in areas where local cops aggressively engage in immigration enforcement are more likely to be separated from their parents and face barriers to reunification. In the counties we surveyed where local police have signed 287(g) agreements with ICE, children in foster care were 29 percent more likely to have a detained or deported parent than in other counties. That disparity remained statistically significant when controlling for the size of the foreign-born population.

In Roberta’s case, as the police officer arrested her, he called the county Child Protective Services, which came quickly to the side of the road and took the children away. The agency placed them in what were supposed to be temporary foster homes, until Roberta could get out of jail.

But she was not released—not until she was deported, without her children.

A Morally Corrupted System

Local immigration enforcement is metastasizing through initiatives like the 287(g) agreements and, most significantly, through a controversial program called Secure Communities, which allows ICE access to data on every person booked into a county jail. As the federal government shifts its deportation tactics away from high-profile workplace raids and toward enforcement that’s silently tied to the day-to-day functions of local police departments, a growing number of long-time residents with families and deep ties to the U.S. are deported. The program is turning jurisdictions around the country into deportation hotspots. We have identified at least 22 states where children in foster care face barriers to reunifying with their detained or deported mothers and fathers.

Whatever the state of the debate, or rancor, over who should and should not be allowed to live in the U.S., the moral and bureaucratic fallout of deporting 400,000 people a year are accumulating to toxic levels. Child welfare caseworkers say that in the face of an opaque detention system, they are helpless to reunify families. And although federal law requires child welfare departments to make diligent efforts toward family reunification, when parents are detained that’s basically impossible.

In Los Angeles, where according to our research, the mother or father of approximately one in every 16 children in foster care has been detained or deported, a caseworker for the country described the frustration. “Ultimately, as social workers our role is to reunify families. I’m not saying that ICE is right or wrong; what I’m saying is, let us do our job, let us reunify families.”

An immigration enforcement system that operates anything like the one we have will run roughshod over most everything.

Some of the most unsettling cases that our research has uncovered involve children who entered foster care when local police arrested non-citizen mothers after they or neighbors called 911 to report domestic violence.

Hilaria, of Phoenix, was arrested because she tried to defend herself against her abusive husband. One day in October 2010, he began berating her and threatening her. In minutes, the words escalated into hitting and choking. Hilaria fought back, freeing herself from the man and running to the kitchen, where she says she picked up a screwdriver and threw it at him, drawing blood.

A neighbor heard screaming and called the police. When the cops arrived, Hilaria’s husband told them that she attacked him and, as is too often the case in domestic violence reports, the officers arrested Hilaria for assault. Because their children were home at the time, the police called Child Protective Services. But when the officers and Hilaria’s abuser told the CPS worker that Hilaria had been the assailant, the caseworker left the children with him. Two weeks later, the child welfare department returned to check on the children. The caseworker now suspected that Hilaria’s husband was using drugs and removed the children from him, placing them in foster care.

Two months later, Hilaria sat on a plastic chair in a small detention center visitation room, speaking through tears. “I’ve had domestic violence before, but I took it for my kids,” she said. “Now they’ve robbed me. I did what I did to defend myself and my kids.”

Hilaria is now applying for a reprieve from deportation, which is available to some victims of domestic violence. But because of the charge of assault against her, it’s not clear the government will grant her a visa—she violates a zero-tolerance policy against “criminal” immigrants. The Obama administration recently announced that it would review the deportation cases of all 300,000 people slated for removal. The policy change, which is designed to stop the deportations of people brought to the U.S. as children and other target populations, does not appear to have helped even those like Hilaria. One year after her arrest, Hilaria is still detained. Her children are still in foster care.

The Abyss of Detention

Four months after Roberta lost her children, she also sat in detention center visitation room, sifting through crinkled papers in a bulging folder to find a photo of two of her children. “It has been four months since I’ve talked to my kids,” she said, looking at the photo of her then 7-year-old son and 9-year-old daughter. The children stood shoulder to shoulder, smiling at the camera in front of a graffiti-scrawled wall near the family’s Phoenix apartment. The boy wore camouflage pants and the girl a pink shirt.

“I would rather die than lose my kids,” Roberta said, tears running down her round face.

“They treat us like animals here,” she complained of the barbed-wire ridged jail in Arizona’s basin cotton fields. According to Roberta, women inmates were given unwashed underwear and detainees were fed stale bread and dirty vegetables for their two meals a day. “But the worst,” said Roberta, echoing the sentiments of other detained parents, “is that I can’t see my kids.”

Three weeks after ICE detained Roberta, the juvenile court held a hearing about her family. Roberta, however, did not know about it. Neither her court appointed attorney nor the child welfare caseworkers or attorneys contacted her.

All of the parents with children in Child Protective Services custody whom we interviewed inside six detention centers said that they missed at least one of their juvenile court hearings. From detention, they could not access the courts and their attorneys could not find them.

ICE is not by law required to detain many of those it plans to deport, but it keeps non-citizens locked up to prevent them from absconding. A parent whose singular concern is getting her kids back is scarcely a flight risk. ICE nonetheless takes confinement to an extreme. Even when parents know about their juvenile court hearings, ICE categorically refuses to transport them to juvenile court hearings where vital decisions about their families are made. In hundreds of interviews with attorneys and caseworkers, not one had ever seen a detained parent appear in person at a hearing. Some detainees are not even able to arrange to phone into the hearings.

Unsurprisingly for a system in which about 85 percent of detainees lack legal representation and can be held for months, sometimes years, in squalid conditions, ICE functions without any obligation to the legal needs of the people it detains. And juvenile court judges are powerless to compel ICE to do anything.

“Parents [should] have an absolute right to be present in a court hearing,” a juvenile court judge in Pima County, Ariz., told us, speaking on the condition of anonymity. “We order that if they are in custody they appear, but these orders are not honored by the detention facilities. We don’t have the authority over the federal centers.”

A month after she was initially detained, Roberta was finally able to contact her court appointed attorney by phone. But the attorney spoke no Spanish and they could not communicate. Roberta still arranged to call in to the next court hearing, but she says that because of a bad phone connection over the detention center phone, she understood nothing uttered in the courtroom.

Without any specific policy for addressing the needs of detained parents, child welfare agencies often treat them as if they’ve abandoned their children. And so, after several months in detention and no contact with her children, Roberta says she got a letter in the mail. “All [the court] sent me was a Spanish sheet with threats,” she said. “If you don’t appear, you’ll lose kids. That’s all it said.”

There was also little chance she could have complied with the child welfare department’s overall plan for family reunification. Detention centers provide parents no access to the services and programs needed to take part in their case plans for reunification, which for her would have consisted of treatment for alcohol abuse, parenting classes and visitation with her children.

Because detainees are often moved to detention centers far away from their homes—an average of 370 miles—they can rarely see their children. Though the Obama administration has said that it plans to overhaul immigration detention practices, including making efforts to detain non-citizens closer to their homes, as of August 2011, this promise did not appear to have taken effect in any significant way.

Parental Rights End at the Border

Josefina and Clara were deported to Mexico after three months in immigration detention. They made their way to Michoacán, 1,000 miles south of the border, to their mother’s home, where they began trying to regain custody of their children.

During a July 2011 phone interview from Michoacán, Josefina spoke quietly about the baby she never got to bid goodbye. “I don’t know where my child is, I have no contact with my baby,” she said. “I didn’t do anything wrong to have my children taken away from me. I didn’t steal, I didn’t do drugs, nothing. Why did they take my children?”

Once parents are deported, the threats to their families grow. While parents are detained, child welfare departments are largely prostrate to reunify families. Once mothers and fathers are deported, however, the agencies often switch gears, actively slowing down the reunification process and sometimes halting those efforts altogether.

Soon after they were deported, the sisters contacted the Mexican consulate in New Mexico to ask for help in regaining their parental rights. The consulate began corresponding with the child welfare department on the sisters’ behalf. For months after their deportation, a staff person at the consulate repeatedly told Clara and Josefina that the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department planned to reunify the family as soon as the sisters could prove that they had stable housing and jobs. Yet, even after they found work and were set up in their mother’s home, the children remained in foster care. Reunification dates cited by the department came and went, but still, no children.

According to the sisters, the New Mexico child welfare department would not let the mothers speak by phone with the youngest two of the three children and Clara spoke only once to her 6 year old. According to Josefina and Clara, they heard word that their children were placed in three different foster homes and the babies were being raised entirely in English. They feared their children would not remember them even if they were reunified and they began to believe they might never see their children again.

“I miss everything about my kids,” said Clara through sobs over the phone. “How I spent Saturday and Sundays with them, how I made my home with them, all of it. Then my children were just gone.”

Many deported parents make the tormented decision to make the bloody desert journey over the U.S.-Mexico border without papers so that they can be present at juvenile court hearings. Caseworkers around the country said that in many cases, when a parent of a foster child is deported, they are back weeks later to appear in a juvenile courtroom to try and reclaim their children.

The risks of crossing are enormous. In addition to growing violence in Mexico against migrants crossing into the U.S., immigrants caught in the country after a previous deportation now face prison time. Until recently, immigrants who were deported before were simply deported again. Now, “illegal reentry” is treated as a federal criminal offense that carries sentences of years. The charge now accounts for nearly half of all federal criminal prosecutions.

Clara and Josefina did not risk crossing back over the border; the fear of violence on the border or of extended incarceration was too great. So for a year, they waited, in fear their parental rights would be terminated.

In late September 2011, their hope dwindling, the Mexican consulate in New Mexico phoned the sisters at their mother’s house in Michoacán. “They told us to go to the airport the next day,” said Clara.

In the morning they drove three hours to the airport. Two employees of the Mexican government escorted the three children off the plane. In the middle of a waiting room at the airport, after 14 months apart, Josefina and Clara took the children into their arms.

The next day, now back at their mother’s home with the sounds of pouring rain in the background, Clara said over the phone, “It hurts me so much to talk about this. I don’t want to remember anymore.” Now the family will try to piece themselves back together.

For many, however, separation is not memory. It is a present horror. In July, after seven months of detention, Roberta was deported to Mexico. She was given no notice before she was loaded onto an ICE bus and dropped at the border. ICE did not give her time to call her children’s caseworker or her court-appointed attorney before her removal and she arrived in Mexico with nothing but $10, given to her by another deportee.

Deportation too often leads to the seamless termination of parental rights. In jurisdictions around the country, child welfare departments and children’s attorneys have successfully argued that it is in a child’s best interest to remain in the U.S. rather than join their parents in another country. Though child welfare departments are required by law to try to reunify children with their parents, and research shows that children fare better with their families than in foster care, the principal is often quashed when a border stands in the way.

Many caseworkers and attorneys noted to us a pervasive bias against placing children in another country. “When you break down the cases, placement with parents in Mexico happens very rarely,” an attorney who represents children and parents in El Paso, Texas, told us. “The knee-jerk reaction of almost everyone is that the children are better off in U.S.”

As a parents’ attorney in Takoma, Wash., said in describing several cases like Roberta’s, “They’re deported and they’re treated like they fall off the face of the earth.”

Some jurisdictions, especially those near the U.S.-Mexico border, are working to interrupt this rapid move to sever families. In San Diego County, Calif., and El Paso County, Texas, for example, the child welfare departments have established international liaisons who work with the Mexican consulate and Mexican child welfare department to place children with their families in Mexico. Without the consulate, Clara and Josefina would still be without their children.

Yet most countries lack any formal policy for deported parents and ultimately, when parents are detained and deported, families are shattered.

In the detention center, before she was deported, Roberta looked up from the photo of her children and stated a policy that many would think is common sense. “If you send the mom to Mexico,” she said, “let her take her kids with her.” It has now been one year since she lost custody of her children. Her family’s status remains in limbo.

Undocumented Immigrant Students at Brooklyn College Form ‘DREAM Team’ (Feet in Two Worlds)

2011-11-02T11:09:00.001-04:00

Undocumented Immigrant Students at Brooklyn College Form ‘DREAM Team’
By Feet in Two Worlds • 11/02/11

NEW YORK—Anayely Gomez looks like your average Brooklyn College student. She wears her dark hair in a high ponytail and a backpack slung over one shoulder. A dimple dots one cheek when she smiles and a determined crease appears in her brow as she describes her new student club. But the 23-year-old bilingual education major will not be able to work as a teacher after she graduates this fall. Teachers in New York State must be fingerprinted. To be fingerprinted, a teacher must submit a Social Security number. Gomez doesn’t have one.

On Monday, October 17, Gomez and Cesar Ventura, a sophomore Latino Studies major, held elections for their student club, “The Dream Team,” the first club on campus to focus on the DREAM Act and immigration issues. Gomez is the new club president and Ventura was elected vice president.

It all began as a Facebook group, where students could post petitions for relatives and friends who were in detention centers or at risk of deportation.

“I want undocumented students to come out and not be afraid anymore. I want them to not be in the shadows,” said Gomez.

On Thurday, October 27, the Dream Team hosted its first event, “The Right to Dream.” Dreamers formed a circle, sharing their stories, and The New York State Youth Leadership Council (NYSYLC) immigration attorney Gisela Chavez-Garcia spoke about “misconceptions about getting your papers”.

Gomez was motivated to become an activist when she ran into problems securing her final set of credits this semester, a student teaching position which required that she be fingerprinted. She searched the Internet for guidance and discovered NYSYLC, an organization run by immigrant youth endeavoring to pass the DREAM act.

Gomez began attending meetings and met another student who had studied bilingual education and had run into the same problem. Since she was interested in a short-term teaching job, Gomez was advised to say that her Social Security card was on its way, and the plan has worked so far.

At NYSYLC, Gomez learned of the nation-wide “dreamer movement” and the DREAM Act, which would allow students who came to the country before the age of 16 to begin a six-year process which, as long as they complete high school and two years of college or military service, could end in permanent citizenship. She decided that fighting for New York State to pass the DREAM Act was her only chance at achieving a better future.

Although she is the oldest of three sisters who are each about a year apart, Gomez’s siblings have not shared her struggles.

When she was three-years-old Gomez and her parents traveled to the U.S. from Mexico City in the back of a truck, with several other families she did not know. Her sister Alma, who is now 22 and has recently reconnected with Gomez through Facebook, was left behind to be raised by her grandparents. Gomez said that she remembers little about the journey, but recalled crouching under leaves and gardening tools as they drove across the border.

“I remember faintly my mother telling me, ‘Don’t say anything. Be quiet,’” Gomez said.

Gomez’s youngest sister Araceli was born in Brooklyn, NY, making her a U.S. citizen. As the oldest, Gomez always tried to to set an example for her sister, working multiple minimum-wage jobs, sometimes 12-hour shifts, while getting consistent A’s in college. Though the sisters are close now, Gomez initially resented Araceli’s privileges as a citizen.

“I had to be her role model, but it hurt that she had it easier,” said Gomez. “She is able to apply to any school, she can get financial aid, she can travel, she can get a state I.D., and she can work anywhere. We got into fights because she seemed to take it for granted and it didn’t seem fair that I had to work twice as hard.”

When Gomez was nine, her father was almost deported when the factory he worked at was raided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He managed to hide under a table and made it home to tell his family about the ordeal. Still, Gomez did not completely understand that her family was different since immigration status was rarely spoken about.

“It didn’t hit me until I tried to get a summer job in high school like my friends. I felt very out of place. I thought, ‘I’m not like my friends. I can’t work. I can’t travel. I can’t vote.’ It was very scary.”

Ventura, who will succeed Gomez as president of the club after she graduates this fall, traveled from Mexico City to Brooklyn when he was eight. Like Gomez, he did not have to worry that he was different until high school when he realized that he could not get a job or learn to drive like his friends. In his senior year, he was accepted to most colleges of his choice, but could not attend them.

Some, like Syracuse University, had tuition and living expenses that were too expensive to manage without financial aid or loans unavailable to DREAMers. Even with a 3.6 GPA, Ventura did not qualify for the limited scholarships available to DREAMers at some schools.

“The reality is CUNY has very few scholarships available for undocumented students. Undocumented students can apply to CUNY Honors College. It’s available only to outstanding undocumented students, and it offers a laptop, a stipend and full tuition scholarship,” said Sofia Carreno, communications coordinator for CUNY’s immigration center, Citizenship Now, which Ventura said had helped him.

“If I wasn’t in this situation I don’t think that I would appreciate everything that I have. In the end it makes me work harder,” said Ventura.

He joined forces with Gomez because he wanted to motivate other DREAMers to tell their stories and speak out for immigration reform.

Ventura had strong words for undocumented students at Brooklyn College who might be afraid to put their parents at risk.

“I know that our parents struggled for us to be here, but they brought us here for a better life. We are not making it better by staying in the shadows. We have to act on what our parents wanted for us. If we cannot get a job, then we cannot have what our parents wanted—a better life. It’s something that we all deserve.”

Gomez agreed. “If we can acquire the language and skills to get a better job, then in the end we will be able to better help our parents,” she said.

While so far the group is predominantly Latino, the club’s new treasurer is Indonesian and they are reaching out to DREAM Act-eligible students of all nationalities. Students at other CUNY schools – Lehman College and Baruch College – have recently formed similar clubs to support the DREAMer movement.

Five personal stories of life in mixed-status families (Southern CA Public Radio)

2011-10-28T22:25:00.001-04:00

Five personal stories of life in mixed-status families
October 28, 2011 | 11:18 AM | By Leslie Berestein Rojas

What is it like to live in a family in which you’re a U.S. citizen, but your spouse, one of your parents, a sibling, an uncle or aunt, even one of your children is undocumented?

During the past week, Multi-American has presented a series of first-person stories from people in families like these. Families of mixed immigration status are surprisingly common. In 2009, the Pew Hispanic Center estimated there were 8.8 million people living in mixed-status families in the United States.

This makes for a conservative estimate, as Pew’s definition was limited to families with unauthorized immigrants and their U.S. citizen children. Even more common are mixed-status extended families, one example being the Kenyan-born family of President Obama, whose undocumented half-uncle was arrested in August, and whose aunt was up for deportation until being granted asylum.

Why are mixed-status families so prevalent in the U.S? The demand for family reunification through legal channels is much larger than the number of available immigrant visas, for one thing. And for those who are in the U.S. illegally, it is much more difficult to adjust one’s immigration status than commonly thought, even through marriage. Those who entered with visas and overstayed stand a better chance, but tighter laws over the years have made it impossible for many people who entered without visas to ever adjust their status.

So what is life like for these families? As those who contributed to the series have explained, things as simple as taking a trip together are fraught with anxiety, or just not done. Those here legally don’t add their spouses to insurance plans or add their names to loan documents. “It’s as if she doesn’t exist,” one person wrote. Here are some highlights from the series.

A woman in Arizona who is a U.S. citizen writes about life with her undocumented husband, who has been unable to adjust his status and is now being deported:
People who don’t have undocumented family members don’t believe me when I tell them he can’t get papers. They don’t believe me when I tell them my brother-in-law can not enter this country legally to pick crops. They always tell me I’m mistaken. Or they’re callous and don’t understand how easy it was for their ancestors to enter, and how difficult it is now.

A man who works with elementary school students in Portland, Oregon public schools writes about how media images and public attitudes affect children in mixed-status households:
Many of my students have a lot of sad issues with their cultural identity, stemming from the kind of hateful things they hear all the time about them and their families. The undocumented population in Portland is pretty big, so there’s not as much fear or secrecy as there are kids growing up having to listen to their neighbors and the media speak about their parents as if they were sub-human. That causes lasting damage to kids, and it sucks.

A woman who was born to Mexican immigrants in Kansas City, Missouri writes about life with her domestic partner, who has tried to adjust her status but remains undocumented:
It hurts to keep so many secrets. I can’t put her on an application for a loan and I have to say I’m the only person in the household. I can’t put her on my health or auto insurance and again – it’s as if she doesn’t exist.

We share a car because I don’t feel comfortable knowing she is driving at night (she works at two restaurants). She works weekends, so I know that there is plenty of police patrol on Friday and Saturday nights. I had to learn to drive stick shift (but that’s a positive)!

I have a professional career and I hate not being able to take her to company events where they may require valid drivers license/identification/etc. I hate that I can go to college and she (who is miles ahead of me), can’t. I hate that she is taken advantage of at work and she can’t just quit or file grievances like I could.

A legal resident in Orange County, California, whose family arrived in the U.S. on temporary visas when he was 13 and overstayed, writes about the fear he feels over what could become of his two undocumented siblings who now have families of their own:
Fear. Fear that my siblings who are still undocumented will be picked up by ICE agents and deported. Fear that they’ll be deported and their children be picked up by Child Protective Services. Fear that they lose their employment due to their legal status.

A young Los Angeles woman who is a U.S. citizen also wrote about her fear and frustration. Despite their attempts to legalize after 21 years here, both her parents are undocumented:
Fear is something we live with. It’s our enemy because it’s always there reminding us of who we are but it’s also our friend since it has been with us for so long.

Fear is involved in everything we do and everywhere we go. Driving or paying with a credit card (no license or valid ID). Deportation is always a possibility as well. Our future as a family is uncertain.

Mixed citizenship status within a family causes frustration, uncertainty, secrecy, lies. It’s a burden at times and something that is thought about every single day.

The personal stories were submitted via KPCC’s Public Insight Network, which solicits input from the public on specific topics.

From cops to courts, confusion reigns over Alabama immigration law (Montgomery Advertiser)

2011-10-27T16:41:00.003-04:00

From cops to courts, confusion reigns over Alabama immigration law
12:08 AM, Oct. 27, 2011

Written by Jay Reeves

BIRMINGHAM -- Alabama's tough new law on illegal immigration was complicated even before the courts got involved. Now that federal judges have blocked parts of the act while letting others take effect, officials say uncertainty reigns even while suspects are being arrested and jailed.

Court cases can vary from one place to the other, depending on how local police apply the law to arrest suspects. Once those suspects get to court, the handling of their cases can vary from judge to judge in the state's more than 450 trial courts at the municipal and county level.

"There's a whole lot of confusion about the law and what we should do about it," said Judge Scott Vowell, a circuit judge in Birmingham's Jefferson County and president of the Alabama Circuit Judges Association.

He said he has a list of troubling reports: In some areas, police are setting up roadblocks near mobile home communities where Hispanic people live. One municipal judge opened court by saying that anyone without a driver's license would be arrested under the law. Another judge told spectators that the need for a translator could be considered evidence against someone.

Other cases of mixed signals are easy to find.

In the north Alabama city of Decatur, four people were arrested on charges of failing to have proper documents and pleaded guilty within hours under a part of the law a federal court has since struck down. The same day in Jemison, a judge threw out a similar charge against a man because the defendant already was free on bond from a federal immigration court.

Court administrators' interpretation of a key part of the law was challenged by a judge in one instance, and a lawyer tried and failed to use the month-old law to throw out a contract reached in May 2010 between a car seller and two purchasers who were living in the country illegally.

Alabama's top law enforcement official, Attorney General Luther Strange, said many people who are uncertain about the law haven't even read it.

While some said the federal court decisions added to the confusion, Strange said they may have instead helped by placing some sections on hold.

"I think it will give people a chance to take a breath and read the provisions," said Strange, whose office is defending the act in court.

State officials are trying to clear up some of the questions through training that began only after the law took effect. The Administrative Office of Courts has sent memos and emails to judges explaining the law, and the Alabama Department of Homeland Security provided an overview for police at a meeting organized by Strange's office.

On Friday, the Alabama District Attorneys Association will hold a meeting for prosecutors in hopes of developing a blueprint for statewide training for law enforcement. Executive director Randy Hillman said many local agencies still aren't enforcing the law because of uncertainty over exactly what it says.

"Right now people don't know how to apply it," Hillman said. "We're feeling our way. It's not that it's not doable, it's just that it's difficult."

Susan Fuqua, the head of a state organization for municipal court officials, said training sessions and legal advice from Montgomery help, but courts constantly disagree over how to enforce laws. Court rulings yet to come could complicate the situation even further, she added.

"There are over 170 municipal courts in Alabama. There are judges there, and they might be on different pages on how to handle it. Are they all in agreement? I can't answer that," said Fuqua, president of the Alabama Municipal Court Clerks and Magistrates Association.

Passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature and signed by GOP Gov. Robert Bentley, the 72-page, 34-section law is considered the nation's toughest crackdown on illegal immigration by both supporters and opponents. It covers a wide range of everyday life, from making it illegal to give an illegal immigrant a ride and requiring schools to check students' citizenship status to barring contracts with illegal immigrants and making them carry documents.

The law originally was set to take effect Sept. 1, but U.S. District Judge Sharon Blackburn blocked implementation while considering challenges from the Justice Department, immigrant rights groups, religious leaders and others. She finally let some sections take effect Sept. 29 but blocked others, and the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals then blocked more of it this month.

As lawyers sorted through the court opinions, some police agencies delayed enforcement. Fuqua said police haven't filed any cases in the municipal court she oversees in the Birmingham suburb of Hoover, but other cities already are prosecuting people.

The four illegal immigrants arrested in Decatur during a pair of traffic stops pleaded guilty Oct. 10 within hours of their detention under a section of the law that created a misdemeanor offense for anyone who was in the country illegally and failed to carry an alien registration document.

Each was ordered to pay $296 in fines and fees and transferred to the custody of federal immigration officials, even though the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocked enforcement of that section of the law four days later.

Municipal court officials said none of the four appealed their convictions, but a defense attorney who represented them did not return messages seeking comment.

Meanwhile, a judge in the central town of Jemison was throwing out the case against a man who was arrested on a similar charge of failing to have documents. His lawyer, Freddy Rubio, argued that the law was unclear and his client was legally in the United States because he was free on bond while challenging a deportation order from a federal immigration judge.

Rubio, an American Civil Liberties Union board member who is part of the coalition challenging the new law, said he has spent years representing immigrant clients yet still isn't sure exactly which parts of the law are now in effect and exactly what they mean.

"It's a mess. It was so big, no one is sure what it is now," he said.

Vowell, the head of the judges' association, agrees.

"Judges need to make an effort to apply the law the same around the state, and that's certainly difficult because of the ambiguity of the law and the opinions that have been issued by the federal courts that have addressed the law," he said. "Some of it will just have to be addressed on a case-by-case basis."

Illegal aliens found riding in rescue vehicle (Alamogordo Daily News)

2011-10-27T16:18:00.003-04:00

Illegal aliens found riding in rescue vehicle
Alamogordo Daily News
By Duane Barbati, Staff Writer

Posted: 10/26/2011 10:09:33 PM MDT

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers are investigating four men two of whom may be illegal immigrants who came through the Border Patrol checkpoint during the weekend in an emergency vehicle.

Otero County Sheriff Benny House said an Otero County Volunteer Fire Department emergency rescue vehicle, assigned to the Chaparral area, entered the U.S. Highway 54 South Border Patrol checkpoint around 7:30 a.m. Saturday en route to Alamogordo.

He said Border Patrol agents conducted standard questioning of the driver. Three occupants of the rescue vehicle were all dressed in volunteer fire department attire and claimed to be U.S. citizens.

House said three of the occupants provided agents with New Mexico driver's licenses for identification.

The men all claimed to be going to Alamogordo to attend a training session, he said.

House said the individuals were identified as Jose Louis Avalos, 29; Omar Oswaldo Lopez, 26; Jaime Rafael Enriquez-Quinones, 21; and Jesus Manuel Fuentes-Ortega, 37.

Avalos and Lopez indicated they are residents of Chaparral and affiliated with the Far South Volunteer Fire Department, he said.

House said Enriquez-Quinones listed his address as Chaparral and Fuentes-Ortega listed his address as Las Cruces.

He said agents discovered through further investigation that Enriquez-Quinones and Fuentes-Ortega were presently in the U.S. illegally.

ICE authorities were notified and responded to the checkpoint and detained the four men, House said.

He said ICE is continuing their investigation into the incident. The rescue vehicle was transported to the Otero County Sheriff's Department and returned to service in the Chaparral area.

Clanton police amend policy to reflect new immigration law (The Clanton Advertiser)

2011-10-26T17:37:00.001-04:00

Clanton police amend policy to reflect new immigration law
By Justin Averette
Published 7:20pm Tuesday, October 25, 2011

The Clanton City Council voted Monday to amend the police department’s policy manual to reflect the state’s new immigration law.

Police Chief Brian Stilwell said a provision of the law requires police departments to enforce the law — if cities refuse, their mayors and police chiefs could face various penalties.

Under the new policy, anyone who is pulled over for a traffic stop or lawfully detained must show one of six forms of identification. Some forms of acceptable ID include a valid Alabama driver’s license, state non-driver ID card, some federal IDs and foreign passports with unexpired U.S. visas.

“Ninety percent of the time, it will stop at the driver’s license,” said Sgt. Neil Fetner.

People who forget to carry their license can usually have their citizenship status verified by providing officers with information like their name, date of birth and social security number.

But Fetner cautions people to not take that chance.

“Have your ID, and be prepared to show your ID,” Fetner said.

People who fail to provide any of the six forms of acceptable ID and can’t be found in any database will be cited and arrested for driving without a license.

Anyone detained must appear before a magistrate within 24 hours to determine citizenship status.

If someone is in the country legally or if the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency fails to provide citizenship status information within 24 hours, the person detained must be immediately released, pending bond on any local charges.

People found to be in the country illegally will be transferred into ICE custody once legal charges are adjudicated.

So far, only one person has gone through the process and was picked up by ICE after seven days in Clanton’s custody.

In that case, a driver was pulled over for having an expired tag. He couldn’t produce any acceptable form of ID. It was also later determined that he gave a bogus name to the arresting officer.

Fetner said the amendment to the department’s policy would be rescinded if federal courts eventually overturn the law, which is being appealed by the U.S. Justice Department and other groups.

He said it’s also likely the state Legislature will close some loopholes and make other changes when it reconvenes early next year, which could also affect the department’s policy.

In the meantime, he said CPD had no choice but to enforce the law as it was written.

“We want to make sure we cover our bases and the city’s liability by enforcing the law,” Fetner said.

Fetner also wanted to stress that the law prohibits law enforcement from “racial profiling,” and that officers will only be checking IDs of people lawfully detained or arrested. The law also provides immunity from the immigration law for victims and witnesses of crimes.

Dream Act Supporters Rally Around Detained South Floridian (NBC Miami)

2011-10-26T17:29:00.001-04:00

Dream Act Supporters Rally Around Detained South Floridian
Protesters are fighting for the release of Shamir Ali while hoping the Dream Act will be signed into law to provide a path to citizenship for students and military service members

By Steve Litz | Tuesday, Oct 25, 2011 | Updated 10:23 PM EDT

The American dream of education has become a nightmare for some who were too young to know they were brought into the country illegaly.

The proposed 'Dream Act' would create a pathway to citizenship for college students and members of the military, but so far, it hasn't passed -- meaning a wave of deportations continues.

One of those deportations may be Shamir Ali, who is on the brink of being returned to India after living in the U.S. 18 years. His mother brought him into the country when he was seven; now 25, the government is ready to deport him to Bangladesh.

Protesters outside the Broward Transitional Center Tuesday are working to make sure that doesn't happen.

"It's just not fair that during an economic boom people came and were taken advantage of, paid low wages, etc., and now they're being told to leave after they built a life in the United States," said Felipe Matos, a protest organizer and friend of Ali's.

Nearly 400,000 illegal immigrants have been deported this fiscal year, the largest number in U.S. history. The government says 55 percent were convicted criminals.

Protesters, however, say the enforcement of current immigration laws is not working, and claim people are being wrongfully detained.

"This is breaking up families," said Kim Matum, who married her British husband inside the transitional facility in July. Immigration officials won't let him out.

"I'm a three hour drive away," Matum said. "I come because I got to support him, got to do what I can because I feel this is totally wrong that he's here [despite being] married to an American...His daughter is [in the] U.S. Navy."

Some 3,000 people have signed a petition in support of Ali, but in a statement Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials say there is no demonstrable evidence that his removal would visit hardship on his family.

Matos and the protesters disagree.

"Shamir is one of many," he said. "That's why we're here, because we're not gonna stop until we can finally get the end of deportation of all Dream Act students."

Ali, meanwhile, will stay in detention until further notice.

Morresi critical of procedures (Standard-Speaker)

2011-10-26T17:23:00.003-04:00

Morresi critical of procedures

BY MIA LIGHT AND AMANDA CHRISTMAN (STAFF WRITERS
)Published: October 26, 2011

A routine traffic stop involving an admitted illegal immigrant has the police chief of a small Carbon County community once again criticizing Immigration and Customs Enforcement - and now the Hazleton Area School District, too.

Beaver Meadows police Chief Mike Morresi said he conducted the traffic stop on Arturo Garcia-Garcia, 34, on Saturday at 2:40 p.m. for traveling at 46 mph in a 35-mph zone on Broad Street. It was during that traffic stop that Garcia-Garcia handed him a fictitious Pennsylvania identification card that listed his address as 10 E. Broad St., Hazleton, according to an investigation report furnished to the Standard-Speaker.

The report states that Garcia-Garcia told Morresi he was in the country illegally for the past 15 years and lived with his girlfriend, with whom he has two children, ages 9 and 11, the report states. Garcia-Garcia said he used the same card to enroll his children in the Hazleton Area School District three years prior, Morresi said.

Garcia-Garcia was taken into custody and the false ID was confiscated. The vehicle and children were released to acquaintances of Garcia-Garcia and he was taken to the Pennsylvania State Police Hazleton barracks for a records check, the report states. Morresi said that check showed he had a prior arrest and driving under the influence conviction in Florida under a fictitious name.

Morresi said during an interview Tuesday that when he checked Garcia-Garcia's record again, it showed the man was cited on four separate occasions by different police departments for driving without a license, the first one in 1993 and the last in 2007. Each time, Morresi said, Garcia-Garcia was issued a citation and released.

Additionally, Morresi wrote another police agency charged Garcia-Garcia with a vehicle code violation recently. That violation caused him to be brought before an immigration judge, who granted him a voluntary deportation for Nov. 5, Morresi wrote.

Morresi said he called ICE with the information, noting he met the requirements for providing him with a detainer for Garcia-Garcia. Immigration told Morresi to release him, refusing to take him into their custody or provide police with a detainer, according to Morresi's report. ICE officials continued, saying the only way they were going to take Garcia-Garcia into custody was if police filed charges. Morresi said he told ICE he would be filing charges, which "forced" ICE to provide a detainer.

Garcia-Garcia was arraigned on charges of false identification to law enforcement, driving without a proper license and speeding before District Judge Joseph Homanko, who set bail at $5,000 straight and set a preliminary hearing for today at 11 a.m.; however, ICE has 48 hours to obtain custody of him from prison, Morresi said.

A Carbon County prison spokesperson said Tuesday that Garcia-Garcia is still listed as an inmate at the facility and cannot be picked up by ICE until he answers to the charges placed against him by Beaver Meadows police.

At the end of the incident investigation report, Morresi wrote he was forwarding the report to explain the "ongoing dilemma" law enforcement has with ICE.

"On previous occasions I was informed by ICE that agents would immediately pick up any illegal immigrant that had a criminal history, was in the country illegally for re-entry or had gang affiliations. As previously stated, Garcia-Garcia did have a criminal history in addition to being in the country illegally for the second time. However, when I presented these facts to ICE they told me to release him or charge him."

A media spokesperson for ICE was made aware of the allegations and as of Tuesday afternoon was looking into the issue. A media spokesperson from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation also was investigating.

Morresi was also critical of the Hazleton Area School District, noting Garcia-Garcia, who also told police he now lives on Allen Street in West Hazleton, said he used the false ID to enroll his children at the Hazleton Area School District and they did not have a problem accepting it. Morresi said the Hazleton Area School District website clearly states three proofs of residency are needed to enroll students.

"In addition to the government problem we have with deporting illegal immigrants, I hope you are in agreement with me that it is bewildering that our locals schools are allowing children of persons with no legal United States proof of residency to attend the schools," he wrote.

After reviewing Morresi's complaint Tuesday, acting District Superintendent Francis X. Antonelli said Garcia-Garcia claimed to have enrolled his children in Hazleton Area schools three years ago, which was more than a year before the district adopted its current student enrollment policy that includes strict proof-of-residency requirements.

"Our registration policy wasn't adopted until the spring of 2010, so these kids were registered before the policy went into effect," Antonelli said.

Even though Garcia-Garcia's immigration status has been brought to his attention, Antonelli said the district is prohibited from taking any immigration-related action.

"We in this state do not have the right to preclude registration or enrollment on immigration status. And I can tell you unequivocally, if we tried, the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) would challenge the district and probably prevail," Antonelli said.

Protecting illegal immigrants to catch criminals (Star Tribune)

2011-10-26T16:54:00.003-04:00

Protecting illegal immigrants to catch criminals
Article by: PAUL McENROE, Star Tribune
Updated: October 26, 2011 - 7:33 AM

One Minnesota county has done an about-face on deportation, bucking federal law to stop violence.

AUSTIN, MINN. - It was after 1 a.m. when the policeman arrived at Patricia Sanchez's house, and he understood in a glance why she had dialed 911. Her face was streaked with scratches and her neck bore the red imprint of a man's hand.

"You're lucky to be alive,'' he said. He arrested her husband for domestic violence with intent to strangle and told the young woman to get an order for protection as soon as the courthouse opened.

The next morning, before returning to work at her packinghouse job, Sanchez stood at a court clerk's window, filling out a piece of paper that was supposed to be strong enough to stop abuse.

While Sanchez waited at the courthouse, though, police were at her home, searching for evidence that her husband was an illegal immigrant. Rummaging through drawers and bedding, an officer noticed a framed photograph on the living room wall. It depicted a woman identified as Lisa Salazar in her white work uniform and hard hat, honored as Quality Pork Processors' Employee of the Month. Except that Salazar looked exactly like Patricia Sanchez. Police also found documents suggesting Sanchez had committed identity fraud to get work and receive benefits for her children.

A week later, Sanchez sat bewildered in the Mower County jail, facing immigration charges and the threat of deportation back to Mexico. The victim had become a suspect.

The frightening June night in 2009 transformed Sanchez's life -- and now it has thrust Mower County into the vanguard of a national struggle over illegal immigration, policing and crime.

Today, after more than a year of soul-searching over law and justice, Mower County has a striking new policy: Illegal immigrants who become victims of violent crime will not be charged with document offenses, giving them immunity to aid the prosecution of more serious, violent felonies.

In Austin, a storied meatpacking town of 24,700 near the Iowa border, the issue has been pushed to the fore by an unlikely voice: Jeremy Clinefelter, the tough-minded assistant prosecutor who helped deport Sanchez's husband and then charged her with felony fraud.

"It didn't feel right morally,'' Clinefelter said. "We're prosecutors. But more that, we're here to be fair and just.''

Mower County may be unique in the Upper Midwest, according to Rice County Attorney Paul Beaumaster, president of the Minnesota County Attorneys Association. But its new approach, he said, could have wider repercussions by removing a form of blackmail used against illegal immigrants.

"The abuser says, 'You can't go to the police, or I'm going to tell them you're here illegally,' '' Beaumaster said. "It's a legitimate use of prosecutorial discretion in assuring that a defendant doesn't get to use our immigration laws as a weapon.''

Yet Mower County wouldn't put its new philosophy into practice until another act of violence played out this year, when another illegal immigrant answered his door and found himself looking down the barrel of a shotgun.

The dilemma

Since Congress created a program called Secure Communities in 2007, local police and prosecutors have been playing an ever-larger role in enforcing federal immigration law. Tens of thousands of illegal immigrants have been arrested and deported, often in a process that started with a routine traffic stop or a set of fingerprints taken at a county jail.

But one question keeps arising: How can police and prosecutors build trust in growing ethnic communities when illegal immigrants who are otherwise law-abiding fear they will face arrest and deportation if they step forward to report crime?

Secure Communities places a priority on catching dangerous illegal immigrants convicted of violent felonies, yet federal documents show that one-fourth of the immigrants deported under the act had no criminal convictions.

At least five states have dropped out of the program in the past year, amid concerns about the potential for abusive and counterproductive tactics.

In Minnesota, however, some influential lawmakers are eager to have the state participate, even though that's not mandatory until 2013.

Last May, after a late-night hearing and without debate, the Legislature adopted an amendment requiring Minnesota to take part in Secure Communities. That legislation stalled at Gov. Mark Dayton's desk, but the passionate debate is not over.

Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek is among those who think Secure Communities is a fine idea.

"Do my deputies go out on the streets and roads looking to arrest illegal aliens?'' he said. "Absolutely not. But if someone is stopped for breaking laws and there is an identity issue involved, then they may be booked like anyone else who breaks a law, and that kind of information is available for [immigration officials] o review.''

Sen. Julianne Ortman, R-Chanhassen, who pressed the legislation last spring, says the issue has been unfairly politicized. "I agree we should have amnesty programs for victims and witnesses who report crimes,'' she said. "But if we're going to house them in our jails or in our custody, we want to find out whether they're here illegally.''

But civil liberties lawyers -- and some prominent lawmen -- disagree.

"You're going to put the community in an adversarial position with their police,'' says John Harrington, a state senator and former St. Paul police chief. "You're taking out the people who are in the best position to tell us about dangerous people in our community.''

A few days after the assault on Sanchez, Jeremy Clinefelter walked into his office, skimmed through the papers on his desk and found what seemed to be just another routine file: Patricia Sanchez, aka Lisa Salazar -- felony fraud-forgery.

Then it hit him: This was the same woman whose husband he had just charged with domestic assault.

He thought it through. Here was a woman who had found the courage to step out of the shadows, confront a criminal and call the police. He knew the investigating officers, too. They hadn't gone to her house intending to trap her. They had stumbled onto the evidence.

He couldn't remember Mower County having a similar case, and now it was his.

Clinefelter was a Hamline law grad. He hailed from Ohio and still kept a photo of a red-drenched Buckeye football stadium on his office wall. He married a woman from Austin and decided it was a good place to settle down. He had started as an assistant prosecutor in 2003, the same year that Patricia Sanchez showed up at Quality Pork to receive her hard hat and knife.

He soon found that, geographically and emotionally, Austin sat at the center of an immigration wave roiling southern Minnesota. The big meatpacking plants across the state's southern tier required an endless supply of workers willing to do grueling, dangerous jobs for modest wages. People willing to travel thousands of miles from the Texas-Mexico border for low wages satisfied it.

But there was a hidden cost to the boom. Austin had hundreds of residents with two, sometimes three, different names. They had purchased stolen IDs from brokers along the Mexican border or once they arrived in the Midwest. That meant there were also hundreds of victims of identity theft somewhere -- crime victims who suffered because of immigrants seeking work.

Inside the plants, the illegal immigrants and their supervisors had a running one-liner: "What's your name today?" a boss would ask as he walked down the line. The worker would smile and just keep cutting.

"It's no secret [that packinghouses] frequently employ illegal aliens using assumed identities," Clinefelter said. "That itself is a federal issue. But it is virtually impossible for an illegal alien to work without [also] committing multiple violations of state law, anywhere from traffic offenses -- no driver's license -- all the way to felony offenses.

"We'll prosecute violations of Minnesota law,'' Clinefelter added. "But cleaning up immigration is a federal issue."

From 2000 to 2009, the Hispanic population in Mower County more than doubled, to nearly 3,500, part of a larger immigration wave statewide. Clinefelter's stolen-identity caseload was running at 50 to 70 files per year by 2005, most of them illegal immigrants. He'd become the office expert on document crimes.

To Clinefelter, however, court files weren't the truest reflection of Austin's new demographics. When he drove through town, whether to one of his children's dance recitals or to play hardball in the town's Over 30 League, he found it more revealing to measure Austin's changing character by the colors and sounds he picked up backstage or along a dugout bench.

On a Saturday morning, he noticed that city basketball courts along the Cedar River were packed with dozens of Hispanic players. All teams in custom uniforms, with their own referees and families hooting friendly Spanish catcalls.

At a dance recital, he had watched his kindergarten son -- red hair and blue eyes -- rush up to a Hispanic family sitting shyly off to the side. "Bianca!' the boy shouted to the little girl. She was his class pal from their reading group. "Dad, she's a Red Cricket!''

Now, Clinefelter had the troubling Sanchez file in front of him. He walked next door to his boss' office.

The lawyers debate

County Attorney Kristen Nelsen listened patiently as Clinefelter outlined the case. She trusted her deputy's instincts and heard him out. Then the debate began.

"What if we'd found drugs in that house?'' she said. "Would we look the other way? A stolen car out front? Would we ignore that because she's the victim of domestic abuse?

"Where do we say, 'Hold on a minute?' '' Nelson said. "What about the people on the other side of identity fraud --the ones who've had their identities stolen?''

Clinefelter came back at her. If we start prosecuting people like Sanchez, he said, it will have a chilling effect on future cases.

The argument went back and forth.

Nelsen was one of Austin's daughters who took the long way home. She had graduated from Austin High School, then the University of Minnesota and then Hamline Law School. She had headed west to Las Vegas for a spell, prosecuting violent felonies, and then became a prosecutor in the District of Columbia.

The road trip had left a mark.

"I learned how to be a prosecutor in Vegas,'' she said. "Lots of charges and stiff penalties. Minnesota people don't go to prison as often as they would in other places. I have a tendency to be on the harsh end."

In the Sanchez case, Nelsen was not moved. Mower County charged the young woman with aggravated forgery, a felony likely to put her on a federal deportation plane.

'I'm not a bad person'

As a teenager, Patricia Sanchez had risked her life crossing the Mexican border and the treacherous Sonoran Desert to get to the United States for a better life. Now, in the summer of 2009, she found herself in a Sherburne County jail cell leased by federal immigration authorities. Her sister in California had taken the children.

"People at immigration see us as criminals,'' she recalled. "I told them: 'I came here to work. I don't use drugs, I don't drink. I am not a bad person.' ''

Meanwhile, her case had been taken up by a St. Paul attorney, former Ramsey County District Judge Alberto Miera. He argued that the police had conducted an illegal search of Sanchez's purse and wanted the fraud case dismissed, a move that infuriated County Attorney Nelsen.

Finally, the attorneys agreed to go to trial on a charge of simple forgery, still a felony. A judge found Sanchez guilty. She received a year's stay, marked down to a misdemeanor if she obeyed the law.

Then, satisfied with a finding of guilt, Clinefelter and Nelsen took a step on Sanchez's behalf -- the crucial step that could save her from deportation. They supported her application for a special visa granted to victims of domestic violence, a document known as a U-Visa. It worked.

By that fall, Sanchez was released from federal custody, reunited with her children, and back at work on the cutting line at Quality Pork.

But the conclusion of her case didn't settle the larger question for Mower County. By late 2010, police Capt. Bill McKichan was back in Clinefelter's office, not to debate the merits of Ohio State football, but to describe the flak that police were catching from Hispanic community groups.

He said Hispanics, wary from the Sanchez case, weren't stepping forward to help solve major crimes they knew about. He wanted a clear policy on immigration crimes from Nelsen's office.

All across southern Minnesota, police and prosecutors were coming to grips with the same dilemma. Just 130 miles west on I-90, the city of Worthington was the scene of a 2006 immigration raid in which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents with Kevlar vests and automatic weapons swept through the Swift meatpacking plant, arresting 230 workers and carrying them off in chartered buses. Distrust permeated the city. To this day, authorities in Worthington say, immigrants often refuse to help police for fear of being deported.

Clinefelter agreed with McKichan. "Finally, I just walked in and said to Kristen that I thought this was bull, and I outlined why,'' he said.

This time, Nelsen agreed. She struck a verbal agreement with police that, going forward, illegal immigrants who were crime victims would not be arrested and charged for their document violations.

"The re-victimization issue came to the surface through this case,'' Nelson said. "We're having our evolution. You have to figure out what's your greater purpose.''

Officials from ICE wouldn't comment on Mower County's policy. But a spokesman for the Bloomington office said: "ICE has a significant history and reputation for working closely with all law enforcement agencies -- local, state, federal and international -- to accomplish the common goal of ensuring public safety. While local governments decide how to approach law-making in their communities, ICE will continue to enforce a wide range of federal immigration laws.''

Immunity for a witness

Months went by and then, in March 2011, a bloody altercation put the county's new policy to the test.

A man had been shot in an Austin apartment and, bleeding profusely, was being rushed by helicopter to Rochester for emergency care. Detective Sgt. Todd Clennon had been assigned to the case and now, in the man's apartment, was following the blood trail across the floor.

Clennon's eyes scanned the room slowly. A spent shotgun case. Flesh on the wall. Religious figurines.

Deeply Catholic, Clennon thought. Probably Hispanic.

"Then it occurred to me that this apartment was really being taken care of,'' Clennon recounted later. "My first thought was this doesn't appear to be a place where you have a guy selling dope."

The shooting was Clennon's first big case as a detective. It would also be the case that tested Mower County's new approach to immigration enforcement.

Alejandro Jimenez-Gonzalez had been shot in the thigh by an assailant who had come to the door holding a shotgun, apparently mistaking it for the home of a drug dealer. Jimenez-Gonzalez had managed to get his two kids outside, and then at the last second, had pushed the gun barrel away from his stomach as the gunman fired.

In the bedroom, Clennon and his partner found a dresser littered with IDs.

"It took me 10 seconds to realize he had two different names,'' Clennon recalled.

The next day Clennon briefed Police Chief Brian Krueger at dawn. He said the victim had been using false documents, probably to get work, but said that issue was "about 800th'' on their list of concerns. The chief agreed. Within days, a suspect was arrested in Rochester and Clennon felt they had a solid case of attempted murder.

A few days later, Clennon took a call from Kristen Nelsen. She had heard that Jimenez-Gonzalez and his family planned to skip town to avoid getting busted for document fraud.

"I'm thinking we need to scramble the jets,'' Nelson told the detective. "Otherwise, this [case] will fall apart."

Nelsen told Clennon she was prepared to give Jimenez-Gonzalez and his wife a letter of immunity from any immigration charges so that he would stay in Austin to testify in the murder case. Clinefelter would draft it.

"My office will not charge you for using false documents to reside in this community,'' the letter read. "This immunity ... has been granted to you because you are the victim of a violent crime.''

It didn't take Clennon long to find Jimenez-Gonzalez's wife.

"We pull up, you could see the [suspicion] in her face,'' Clennon said. Was it a ploy? A trick?

His partner read Nelsen's immunity letter to her in Spanish. "You could see this glow come over her face,'' Clennon said. "They could live in the U.S. without a knock on their door."

Meanwhile, Clinefelter wanted the family under formal federal immigration protection. He contacted Dan Donnelly, an experienced immigration attorney in Austin, who took the case pro bono.

Jimenez-Gonzalez has agreed to stay. The man accused of shooting him is expected to face trial before the end of the year, and Jimenez-Gonzalez will be there to testify.

The decision to trust the judicial system has come with a cost. Jimenez-Gonzalez lost his job at Quality Pork for using false documents - employers now face stiff federal penalties for employing undocumented workers.

"But I bet Alejandro would say it was worth it,'' Clennon said. "Shoot me in the leg in order to get that visa? [It got] that fear out, so they never have to be looking over their back.''

As for Patricia Sanchez, she works the day shift at Quality Pork. The kids are doing well in school and they are all living legally in the United States.

She is dating a man who, she says, treats her very well. He said he is an illegal immigrant who found a job in Austin.

Local business raided Friday (The Sun-Times)

2011-10-26T15:26:00.002-04:00

Local business raided Friday

By Staff reports
The Sun-Times
Posted Oct 26, 2011 @ 11:00 AM

Heber Springs, Ark - On October 21, about 11 a.m., a total of 29 illegals were retained after all four El Tres Amigos restaurants were raided by the Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, along with local, state, Federal, and IRS agents, according to official sources.

The El Tres Amigos owner was also detained for identity theft.

The raids took place in Heber Springs, Rose Bud, Mountain View, and Batesville.

Perkasie dad faces deportation (PhillyBurbs.com)

2011-10-25T10:40:00.004-04:00

Perkasie dad faces deportation
Posted: Tuesday, October 25, 2011 5:55 am
By Theresa Hegel Staff Writer

Three-year-old Noah Orellana-Garcia hasn’t seen his father for three months, not since an early July morning tore his family apart.

Miguel Orellana-Garcia, 24, of Perkasie, was getting ready to leave for his job at the Richlandtown feed mill where he’s worked for the past four years.

He stepped out the front door and was apprehended by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents who had been waiting nearby, said Jessica Winkler, 25, Orellana-Garcia’s fiancee.

“They threw Miguel on the floor right in front of Noah,” said Winkler, a U.S. citizen. “We were in shock. We didn’t know what was going on.”

As far as the couple knew, Orellana-Garcia was in the country legally, under temporary protected status, having come to the United States with his family from hurricane-ravaged, war-torn El Salvador when he was 9.

Since that day in July, Orellana-Garcia has been sitting in York County Prison, awaiting a deportation hearing scheduled for Thursday.

Orellana-Garcia’s abrupt change in status from legal to illegal stems from a handful of misdemeanor arrests and a court letter that never reached its intended destination.

Orellana-Garcia received a DUI charge for underage drinking in 2006 and was twice arrested for possession of a small amount of marijuana, in 2007 and 2009. He served no jail time, receiving instead 30 days’ probation for each of the drug charges.

But because of those infractions, the government revoked Orellana-Garcia’s temporary protected status, said Dave Bennion, Orellana-Garcia’s lawyer. Any two misdemeanors, even for something as minor as shoplifting, could trigger the change in status, he added.

“He had these run-ins, it’s not uncommon for people of that age,” Bennion said of his client. “It was certainly a mistake, but he’s been trying to get things on track. ... I think that the consequences of those actions are disproportionate. It wouldn’t stand in the criminal system, but in the immigration system, it’s pretty much anything goes.”

Orellana-Garcia’s status was revoked in 2007, but the notice of his court hearing for immigration proceedings wasn’t sent out until 2010, to an old address, Bennion said.

Because Orellana-Garcia never received the letter, he missed his court date and was ordered deported by a Philadelphia judge, he said.

Representatives from ICE’s local Office of Chief Counsel, prosecuting Orellana-Garcia’s deportation hearing, declined to comment on the case, saying it was against the office’s policies.

Harold Ort, an ICE spokesman, would say only: “(Orellana-Garcia) was ordered removed by an immigration judge in absentia in May 2010. He was subsequently arrested by ICE officers in July 2011 as a fugitive alien. However, in August 2011 an immigration judge granted a motion to reopen the case.”

Orellana-Garcia’s example is common under the “unforgiving and inhumane” immigration system in the U.S., said Douglas Massey, an immigration expert and professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University.

“This guy is just the latest face in a bureaucratic system that’s doing this to hundreds of thousands of people every year,” Massey said. “Congress has made it very difficult to be an immigrant in the U.S. today.”

A 1996 law made immigrants — even permanent residents — subject to deportation if ever convicted of a crime, whether the crime was the result of changes in immigration law or something minor done by a youth who has since turned his or her life around, he added.

The government has “streamlined” the deportation process, allowing record numbers of immigrants to be detained, often in secret and without a trial, Massey said.

In the last fiscal year, ICE deported nearly 400,000 people, the largest number in the agency’s history, according to John Morton, director of the agency.

Among the 396,906 people deported, more than 1,000 were convicted of homicide. An additional 5,800 were sexual offenders, and about 80,000 had been convicted of drug-related crimes or driving under the influence.

“This comes down to focusing our resources as best we can on our priorities,” Morton said. “We continue to hope for comprehensive immigration reform at a national level, working with the Congress, but in the meantime, we work with the resources we have, under the laws we have.”

The agency has three priority areas: the identification and removal of criminals and national security threats, fugitives, and recent border entrants and others who game the system, according to its website. The agency said focusing on these areas has had a profound positive effect on public safety.

About 55 percent of the people deported in the last fiscal year had felony or misdemeanor convictions. The number of deported aliens convicted of crimes is up 89 percent from 2008, according to agency officials.

Because of his drug arrests and underage DUI, Orellana-Garcia falls under one of ICE’s high priorities for deportation.

In a way, Orellana-Garcia was lucky his fiancee witnessed his apprehension and was able to secure a lawyer before being rushed out of the country, Massey said.

But Orellana-Garcia’s family isn’t feeling so lucky.

Winkler, five-and-a-half months pregnant with their second child, had to move out of their Perkasie home, squeezing into Orellana-Garcia’s mother’s place in Allentown. She had to get a full-time factory job in Pennsburg, leaving Noah with her mother in Milford during the day.

Before Orellana-Garcia was detained, Winkler was a full-time mom, while Orellana-Garcia worked 53-hour weeks to support his growing family.

Despite the long workweeks, Orellana-Garcia still found time to take his young son to the park or other outings, Winkler said.

“It’s a handful, trying to take care of a 3-year-old, being pregnant, working and having the stress of not knowing what’s going to happen to Miguel on top of that,” she said.

The stress has affected Noah as well. The once calm and collected young boy now acts out, constantly telling his mother he’s mad.

He hoards snapshots of his father, telling Winkler, “I need these pictures so I don’t forget my daddy.”

Though they talk on the phone daily, Winkler has only been to see Orellana-Garcia once in the last three months because the long drive to York for a half-hour visit is too depressing to bear. Noah hasn’t been to visit at all because Orellana-Garcia doesn’t want his son to see him behind glass in a prison, Winkler said.

If Orellana-Garcia is deported, moving with him to El Salvador is not an option for Winkler and Noah, especially since she also has a 9-year-old son with another father.

Orellana-Garcia has spent the majority of his life in the U.S. and barely remembers his time in El Salvador. His family — mother, father, siblings, grandfather — has been living in America legally for years. His three younger siblings are citizens who were born in this country.

Orellana-Garcia never embarked on the path to citizenship because under temporary protected status, it’s very difficult to get a green card, according to Bennion. While Orellana-Garcia had TPS, he would have had to leave the U.S., triggering multiple bars to re-entry, before applying for permanent residency, he added. This would have been true, even if he had married Winkler while his TPS was active, Bennion said.

Though Orellana-Garcia still speaks Spanish — in addition to English — he would stick out as a foreigner were he to go back to the country of his birth, Bennion said.

“He would be an obvious target for kidnapping,” he said. “(Gangs) would assume he had family in the U.S. who could pay ransom.”

On those grounds, Bennion plans to apply for asylum for Orellana-Garcia, though he’s not optimistic about the chances for success. He’s hoping to get Orellana released from detention to give him the chance to prepare and fight his case in court.

“It’s not a huge request,” Bennion said.

Winkler is hoping the judge on Thursday will look beyond Orellana-Garcia’s criminal record to see the family man he is now.

“(The judge) sees this little part of Miguel’s life,” Winkler said. “He doesn’t know who Miguel is. He doesn’t see him at work, or at home with his family.”

And Noah is just hoping to see his father again.

“I want daddy to come home because I miss him,” Noah said.

Farm workers, Vermont governor discuss immigration issues (Burlington Free Press)

2011-10-21T16:45:00.002-04:00

Farm workers, Vermont governor discuss immigration issues
3:24 PM, Oct. 17, 2011
Written by Mike Donoghue

A small group of farm workers and supporters say they were pleased with their meeting last week with Gov. Peter Shumlin and his legal counsel to discuss immigration issues in Vermont and ways to modify policing policies when it comes to migrant workers.

"We feel that it was a good dialogue. They did not make any specific promises, but we look forward to keeping the conversation open," said Natalia Fajardo of the Vermont Migrant Farmworker Solidarity Project.

Five farm workers and five other supporters, including translators, met with legal counsel Beth Robinson for more than an hour, Fajardo and Robinson estimated. They said Shumlin was able to stay for about 20 minutes.

"It was helpful to hear everybody's perspective," Robinson said. She said the conversation centered on "how they would like to see how the state moves in general with some goals."

The meeting came on the heels of a Sept. 13 traffic stop by Vermont State Police that netted two Mexicans whom the U.S. Border Patrol said were in the United States illegally. The State Police Advisory Commission ruled Wednesday that Senior Trooper Jared Hatch had followed the department's Bias Free Policing Policy after stopping a Vermonter driving 88 mph in a 65 mph zone on Interstate 89 in Middlesex.

Excessive nervousness, inconsistent answers and a failure on the part of the two passengers to make eye contact with Hatch led the trooper to ask additional questions, the advisory commission said. The trooper's questions were not motivated by the passengers' actual or perceived race, color or national origin, according to the commission , which consists of seven state residents appointed by the governor.

The panel noted that Hatch, when stopping the compact pickup, was unable see the driver, who was from Vermont, or the two passengers, who were from Mexico.

Danilo Lopez and his cousin Antonio Meza-Sandoval were later detained.

Lopez, who is active with the Solidarity Project, "contacted them and this set off a chain of calls and rapid response eventually leading to the farmworkers release from Border Patrol later that evening," the Solidarity Project's news release said.

The director of the Vermont State Police said Friday that the issue of bias-free policing is an important topic. Col. Tom L'Esperance said he spoke with Brendan O'Neill from the Solidarity Project and is hoping to schedule a meeting with him this week.

"The dialogue regarding immigration needs to continue, so that the Vermont State Police can ensure the fair and humane treatment of all people living and working in Vermont while providing professional, accountable, and compassionate law enforcement services," L'Esperance said in a written statement to the Burlington Free Press.

Part of the meeting with Shumlin included viewing a five-minute video designed to show the Middlesex case wasn't an isolated incident, Fajardo said. She said the incidents outlined in the video happened in Vermont, including one at Burlington International Airport. The video also includes one person talking about not wanting to report a theft because of immigration status.

The Solidarity Project said the five farm workers at the meeting represent at least 1,500 workers who help sustain the dairy industry and landscapes. The topics Friday came from a "long series of meetings and surveys by the farmworker community," Fajardo said.

Lopez, one of the two undocumented immigrants detained Sept. 13, had chatted in passing with Shumlin about immigration issues about three weeks before the stop.

BRIDGETON POLICE BEAT (The Daily Journal)

2011-10-21T16:43:00.001-04:00

BRIDGETON POLICE BEAT
Oct. 18, 2011

Jose J. Jimenez, 21, of East Avenue was arrested about 5:25 p.m. Saturday and charged with driving while intoxicated after his vehicle sideswiped a marked police car that had stopped at the side of the road for a traffic stop. He was held in the county jail on a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer.

Public safety: Man arrested on 347 for human smuggling (Maricopa Monitor)

2011-10-21T16:38:00.001-04:00

Public safety: Man arrested on 347 for human smuggling
Staff reports
Published: Friday, October 21, 2011 11:08 AM MST

A Casa Grande man was arrested Monday night by the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office on Arizona 347 for human smuggling.

Sheriff’s Office spokesman Elias Johnson said a deputy heading north on Arizona 347 observed two vehicles traveling in tandem at a high rate of speed around 7:45 p.m. Monday. The lead vehicle was a tan 2000 Lincoln LS and the second was a blue 2003 Dodge Grand Caravan. The deputy ran the license plates and both came back as operating with cancelled insurance. The deputy initiated a traffic stop on the lead vehicle at milepost 167. The car came to a stop and two Hispanic males fled into the desert. The driver and a passenger in the rear were apprehended. The second vehicle got away.

The driver was identified as Dominique Reggie Guillen, 18, of Casa Grande. Johnson said Guillen told the deputy he was only 17 years old, but MVD records confirmed he was 18. The passenger was identified as Gregoro Antonio Martinez-Diaz of Mexico. Martinez-Diaz was found to be in the country illegally and did not speak English.

Deputies searched both Guillen and Martinez-Diaz. Guillen was in possession of $1,256.60 and Martinez-Diaz was in possession of $2,750. Martinez-Diaz was turned over to U.S. Border Patrol agents for processing.

Guillen was booked into jail for human smuggling and unlawful transport of an illegal immigrant.

Immigrant detainee's request to stay in U.S. to marry denied (The Star-Ledger)

2011-10-21T16:26:00.003-04:00

Immigrant detainee's request to stay in U.S. to marry denied
Published: Thursday, October 20, 2011, 7:35 PM
By Julia Terruso/The Star-Ledger

NEWARK — For Ruben Quinteros the news keeps getting worse. Quinteros, an immigrant detainee sitting in Delaney Hall in Newark, was picked up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers seven days before he was due to get married last month.

He had overstayed his visa. Today, his lawyer received a fax from ICE rejecting his request for a Stay of Removal.

Quinteros and his fiance, Neida Lavayen have been together for two years and had planned to marry Sept. 23. Since her fiance was detained, Lavayen has been on a mission to marry Quinteros. But she’s hit roadblocks every step of the way.

She cannot find a clerk willing to travel into the detention center to issue a marriage license, which can only be obtained in person. And Quinteros is not permitted to leave the detention center, though ICE officials would permit a clerk to issue a license on site.

If he is married, Quinteros has a good chance of getting a green card and staying in the country, attorneys specializing in immigration law have said. ICE already has the travel papers to send Quinteros back to Uruguay, an ICE official said.

Escondido woman turned over to immigration after domestic violence incident (North County Times)

2011-10-20T15:33:00.003-04:00

Escondido woman turned over to immigration after domestic violence incident

By EDWARD SIFUENTES | Posted: Wednesday, October 19, 2011 8:00 pm

A woman who called the Escondido Police Department to report that she was beaten by her boyfriend was herself arrested and later turned over to immigration authorities after she was booked at the Vista jail, a case that critics say illustrates the problems inherent in local police getting involved in immigration enforcement.

Elena Cabrera, 36, said she came home tired from work on the morning of Aug. 20 and wanted to sleep a little. But her then live-in boyfriend, Jorge Melgar, 50, wanted her to do house chores and began beating her when she refused. When police arrived, he told the officers that she had also hit him, Cabrera said.

Cabrera said she did not hit him, but was arrested anyway. She had a bloody lip and bruises on her face, she said.

Escondido police Lt. Craig Carter said both people were arrested on suspicion of domestic violence and there were injuries on both of them. Carter said the department did not turn Cabrera over to immigration authorities.

After the couple was arrested, the couple's four minor children were left home alone, Cabrera said. Police are investigating the family's complaint that the kids were left without supervision, Carter said.

Bill Flores, a retired assistant sheriff and a member of the human rights group El Grupo, said Escondido's close working relationship with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement hurts its ability to protect the community. He said police officers knew that Cabrera would be screened for immigration violations at the Vista jail and chose to take her into custody.

Incidents like Cabrera's hurt the department's relationship with the community, Flores said, making immigrants less likely to report crimes in the future.

"Everybody in that neighborhood found out what happened," Flores said. "She was a victim of domestic violence, she was taken to jail and she ended up getting turned over to ICE. All because she sought help from the Escondido Police Department."

After being arrested, Cabrera was taken to the Escondido Police Department and later to the Vista jail, where ICE placed an immigration hold on her, apparently as part of its Secure Communities program. Secure Communities links local jails to federal databases to identify illegal immigrants who are booked into the facilities.

"I never thought that this would happen to me," Cabrera said during an interview last week. "To me, it was a complete surprise."

A spokeswoman for ICE in San Diego declined to comment on the case.

Cabrera spent several days at the Vista jail before she was turned over to immigration authorities. Cabrera had an immigration petition pending as a victim of domestic violence related to a prior relationship. Under a law called the Violence Against Women Act of 1994, battered women who are married to U.S. citizens can apply for an immigrant visa.

Melgar, a legal resident, was not turned over to immigration authorities. He spent four days in jail before he was released.

Lilia Velasquez, a San Diego immigration attorney representing Cabrera, said having the visa petition does not necessarily mean that a victim is safe from deportation. However, under a new policy by the Obama administration, immigration authorities have discretion on when to pursue deportation procedures.

The Obama administration has said it wants to focus its resources on deporting violent illegal immigrant criminals, immigrants who have been ordered deported by an immigration judge and people who repeatedly have been caught in the country illegally.

"Given the new policy of prosecutorial discretion, ICE should have removed the hold (on Cabrera) once they ascertained she was a (Violence Against Women Act) beneficiary," Velasquez said.

The San Diego County District Attorney's office declined to file charges against either Cabrera or her boyfriend. She was released from immigration custody on Aug. 28 due to her Violence Against Women Act visa petition.

Critics say that the Obama administration's immigration policies, including Secure Communities, have created a dragnet that catches not only violent criminals but also people whose only violation is being in the country illegally. Those policies break families apart, tearing parents away from their U.S.-born children, critics say.

While she was detained, Cabrera's four children, ages 3 to 17 years old, were left in her Escondido home without supervision, she said. Her oldest daughter, Tayana Zarate, 17, said she had to care for her siblings while trying to figure out where her mother was being held and how to have her released.

Tayana said a neighbor helped her buy food and drove her around to find her mother.

"They never asked who I was, my name, how old I was, is there a grown-up in the house?" Tayana said last week. "They don't care."

The family filed a complaint with the police department for leaving the children without supervision. Tayana and her mother spoke with police detectives last Thursday night about the complaint.

Carter said the officers noted in their report that they left the children in the care of an "18-year-old female."

The department also came under fire last year when it announced that it had forged a new alliance with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement allowing several immigration officers to work out of its headquarters. Operation Joint Effort, as the program is called, is the only one of its kind in the county. It has been credited by the department with the arrest of over 400 criminal illegal immigrants since it started in May 2010.

Under the program, immigration officers are available to help police officers identify people who have been previously deported or who have been ordered deported, according to Escondido police officials. They are also available to join the police on special operations, such as anti-gang raids.

However, Carter said that Cabrera's arrest had nothing to do with Operation Joint Effort.

"This has nothing to do with immigration," Carter said. "This is a domestic violence issue."

Protesters call for immigrant's release (The Detroit News)

2011-10-20T15:30:00.001-04:00

Protesters call for immigrant's release

Last Updated: October 20. 2011 1:00AM
Josh Katzenstein/ The Detroit News

Detroit— More than a dozen people braved the rain Wednesday afternoon to rally in front of the Detroit office of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on behalf of Cesar Hernandez Montoya, a man they hope won't be deported to Mexico.

The 24-year-old, who lives with his family in Sturgis, has been detained at the Calhoun County Correctional Center in Battle Creek since August, when police found him driving without a license and later discovered he didn't have proper immigration documents.

Montoya, a Sturgis High School graduate, worked as a disc jockey and was hoping to go to college next year, family members said. He was active in church and the community and never had a problem with the law before the traffic violation.

In a statement Wednesday, immigration officials said Montoya will remain in custody until his removal proceedings; no date was available Wednesday.

"(He) was allowed to voluntarily depart to his home country on two separate occasions and returned without permission prior to his most recent arrest," the statement read. "Following a hearing, he was denied bond by an immigration judge and ordered detained. He remains in custody pending the outcome of removal proceedings."

More than 2,000 people sent petitions to ICE asking for Montoya to be freed, and Wednesday's rally was an additional show of support, backers said.

Austin Police: [Immigrants] Held Hostage (AP via WTAW)

2011-10-20T15:28:00.001-04:00

Austin Police: [Immigrants] Held Hostage
Posted by Chace Murphy
Thursday, October 20th, 2011

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) _ Austin police have arrested a man after finding at least eight men they believe were immigrant hostages at a house on the city’s east side.

Fernando Sandoval Salazar was booked into the Travis County Jail charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Bond was set at $100,000. Online jail records listed no attorney for the Mexican national.

Police Cmdr. Donald Baker says one of the suspected captives was able to call his wife in New York and tell her he was being held against his will for a $1,800 ransom. Officers arrived at the house Sunday evening and found Salazar, whom Baker said appeared to be in charge of the operation. Other suspects are being sought.

D.C. won’t cooperate with federal immigration enforcement (Washington Post)

2011-10-20T15:26:00.002-04:00

D.C. won’t cooperate with federal immigration enforcement
By Tim Craig, Published: October 19

D.C. Mayor Vincent C. Gray reaffirmed Wednesday that District police and other public agencies will not cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, leaving it up to federal immigration officials to determine on their own whether a resident is in the country illegally.

The decision reinforces executive orders by past District mayors, but Gray (D) and council members say it goes further by explicitly setting standards for how the city’s criminal justice system will deal with immigrants.

“In the spirit of ‘One City,’ and assuring the equal treatment of citizens and noncitizens alike, I am delighted to sign to this,” Gray said.

Under the new guidelines, which Gray signed while surrounded by Hispanic and African immigrants, D.C. police and corrections officials will not ask those they come in contact with about their immigration status. District police also will not enforce an ICE detainer or warrant issued against someone who has not committed another crime.

Police and jail officials are forbidden from contacting ICE to have the agency investigate the legal status of someone who has been arrested.

Instead, Gray and Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said, police will process all offenders in the same manner and leave it up to the FBI and ICE to decide whether to check on their legal status.

For less-serious crimes, such as violating the city’s open-container law, the District no longer collects fingerprints. So the FBI and ICE can’t determine immigration status, officials said.

“Law enforcement agencies that honor ICE detainers help protect public safety,” ICE spokeswoman Cori W. Bassett said.

For major crimes, such as robbery or drug possession, police will continue to collect the offender’s fingerprints and forward them to the FBI. It will be up to the FBI to share information with ICE.

If ICE determines that it wants to detain offenders upon their release from jail, the agency will have only 48 hours, excluding weekends and holidays, to pick up a suspected illegal immigrant from custody. The city will not hold inmates that ICE wants detained past 48 hours, Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Paul Quander said.

“What this does is makes clear immigration status is not relevant in a criminal matter and makes clear the District will not take any affirmative step to enforce immigration civil matters,” Quander said.

Kristopher Baumann, chairman of the D.C. Fraternal Order of Police labor committee, blasted the decision, saying that until now local criminal justice officials were willing to give ICE more than 48 hours to pick up someone it wanted detained.

“Vince Gray right now is under such duress, he is willing to pander and fold to any group in order to take the scrutiny off himself,” Baumann said. “He has now decided to go out and jeopardize public safety. This is not about regular immigrants. This is about hard-core criminals and bad, bad guys.”

In Prince William County, where law enforcement officials check the immigration status of those arrested, Board of County Supervisors Chairman Corey A. Stewart (R-At Large) called Gray’s move “disturbing and reprehensible.”

“I find it incredibly ironic that the immigration laws of the United States are not even enforced within the boundaries of our nation’s capital,” Stewart said in a statement.

Gray countered that the policy will make the District safer by making someone in the country illegally less afraid to interact with police or report alleged crimes.

Some immigrants and activists played down Gray’s order, noting that District mayors have been distancing the city from immigration enforcement for decades.

“Mayor Gray has implemented and confirmed a policy that was initiated by the Marion Barry administration in 1984,” activist Jose Sueiro said.

But others called it a major morale boost for local immigrants concerned about tough new immigration laws in several states, including Arizona and Alabama.

“It reinforces things for people who are scared,” said Maria Gomez, president of Mary’s Center, an Adams Morgan health center. “And people have been running scared.”

The Case of the Concerned Citizen, the Harmless Korean, and the Port Angeles Border Patrol (Seattle Weekly)

2011-10-20T15:13:00.003-04:00

The Case of the Concerned Citizen, the Harmless Korean, and the Port Angeles Border Patrol
By Keegan Hamilton
Thu., Oct. 20 2011 at 9:00 AM

Hung Han was helping his elderly parents pack up their produce stand at the Port Angeles farmers market on the afternoon of Saturday, September 3 when he was approached, seemingly at random, by a pair of Border Patrol agents. The slender 37-year-old became "visibly nervous," as the agents later noted in their report, when they asked him for proof of citizenship. He replied in broken English that all he had was a Washington ID. A crowd of onlookers gaped as Han, wearing slacks and a button-down dress shirt, was then handcuffed and taken away in the back of a Border Patrol SUV. He spent the next 45 days locked up in the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma.

As the Peninsula Daily News later reported, the crowd at the farmers market was "shocked" by Han's apparently unprovoked arrest. It was the reportedly the first time the Border Patrol ever visited the twice-weekly market, and Han was the only person they questioned.

But according to documents obtained by Seattle Weekly, Han was targeted because an anonymous "concerned citizen" called to report an illegal immigrant from Korea "hanging around" the farmers market. Han's family has sold sushi and vegetables from their garden at the market for the past three years, and their son routinely lends a hand, a family friend said after Han's court hearing on Tuesday in Tacoma.

Though they had no proof that Han was actually undocumented -- save for his poor command of English and nervous mannerisms -- the agents detained Han and the Department of Homeland Security set his bail at $60,000. He has no criminal history, his mother is a legal permanent resident, and his father and sister are U.S. citizens. His only previous run-in with the law was a speeding ticket.

A spokesperson for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) did not return a request for comment on Han's case.

Han's arrest and lengthy detention are the latest in a recent series of controversial actions by the Border Patrol outpost on the Olympic Peninsula.The agency is building a new $5.7 million headquarters on the outskirts of Port Angeles, and some residents -- including the mayor -- have complained about the agency's aggressive tactics and alleged racial profiling. In May, a 42-year-man drowned while attempting to run away from the Border Patrol in nearby Forks, and three months later whistleblower agent Christian Sanchez told reporters that the area's agents have "no purpose, no mission," and are wasting taxpayer dollars.

On Tuesday, an immigration judge reduced Han's bond amount to $1,500 after hearing the evidence in the case and testimony from his attorney that Han helps care for his ailing father and has "strong ties" in the community, where he has lived for more than eight years. His parents paid the money, and Han was released later that afternoon with orders to appear at another hearing that has yet to be scheduled.

Han was represented by Jorge Barón, director of the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project. Barón believes the case is further proof that many of the record number of immigrants detained and deported over the past year are not threats to public safety, despite the government's claims to the contrary.

"ICE is saying we're focusing our resources on people who are dangers to the community," Barón says. "That's certainly not the case, at least not in our region. What you hear coming out of Washington, D.C., is not the reality -- or at a least it's not a fully accurate portrait -- of what's happening on the ground."

Teen cartel killer’s mom sentenced in immigration case (San Diego Union-Tribune)

2011-10-19T10:06:00.002-04:00

Teen cartel killer’s mom sentenced in immigration case
Written by Morgan Lee
7:57 p.m., Oct. 18, 2011

SAN DIEGO — The mother of a 15-year-old San Diego-born boy convicted this year of killing on behalf of a Mexican drug cartel has been sentenced to one year in jail on immigration charges, officials said Tuesday.

Yolanda Lugo Jimenez, 44, pleaded guilty in February in U.S. District Court to being in the country illegally after being deported to Mexico because of a 1997 felony drug conviction. She was sentenced Monday by Judge Roger Benitez.

Lugo was detained by federal agents outside her Logan Heights apartment on Dec. 6 — four days after Mexican soldiers captured her son, Edgar Jimenez Lugo as he prepared to board a flight from central Mexico to Tijuana in hopes of reaching his mother.

Edgar was convicted in July of homicide and organized crime charges in the beheading of four men and is serving a three-year sentence in a juvenile detention facility in Mexico. The August 2010 killings ended with mutilated bodies being strung from a bridge in Cuernavaca, a tourist destination just south of Mexico City.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has placed a hold on Yolanda Lugo that would turn her over to immigration officials once her sentence is completed in December, said agency spokeswoman Lauren Mack. A previous conviction makes it likely Lugo will be deported.

She might seek to defer deportation, said her attorney, Jack Boltax, who declined to specify on what grounds.

Lugo’s husband, an undocumented immigrant with no criminal record, also was arrested on Dec. 6 and was returned to Mexico. The couple have two elementary school-aged daughters who were born and raised in the United States. Edgar is Lugo’s child from a previous relationship.

Monroe college student faces deportation back to Poland (Stamford Advocate)

2011-10-18T11:18:00.001-04:00

Monroe college student faces deportation back to Poland
Vinti Singh, Staff Writer
Published 10:30 p.m., Friday, October 14, 2011

MONROE -- There was nothing "voluntary" about it, but 19-year-old Paulina Krynska felt as if she had no other choice. If she didn't sign the voluntary deportation agreement, she would have to go into hiding, constantly dreading the day Immigration and Customs Enforcement tracked her down.

She signed the document. But it was a decision she would come to regret -- just a few hours later.

Krynska's father, Dariusz, and mother, Ewa, first came to the U.S. on tourist visas on the advice of relatives in New York and moved into an apartment in Queens. Krynska's father then obtained a work visa and her mother a student visa. The family moved to Monroe in 2005.

Krynska came to the U.S. from Poland on a tourist visa when she was 11, but never returned there. She has a Social Security number that she got when she was issued a work permit for her first high school job. She used that to get a driver's license and pay taxes on the wages she earned working at local coffee shops. She was able to extend her stay in the U.S. when she was granted dependent status, but she has been here illegally since the extension expired in 2006, according to documents the U.S. Department of Homeland Security sent her.

When DHS sent her a letter that said she was "removable," her family hired a lawyer who helped them navigate the immigration court system. In August, he told Krynska she had little choice but to sign the voluntary departure.

The car ride to Hartford on the day she went to sign the agreement was mostly silent, she said. Her lawyer asked her if she was sure of her decision. It was highly unlikely she would be allowed to return to the U.S. unless it was as a fiance to an American citizen, she was told.

"Mostly, I was just like sad," Krynska said. "I wanted to cry."

She signed the document on Aug. 18 at 8:30 a.m. She agreed to leave the country no later than Dec. 16. But what she didn't know was on that very same day, President Barack Obama announced he was establishing a new process to handle deportation cases. His administration would focus more effort on deporting criminal immigrants in the country illegally. The president said in May that immigration officials would focus on violent offenders and not families or "folks who are looking to scrape together an income."

Krynska graduated from Masuk High School and attends Naugatuck Community College as a liberal arts and science major. She plans to transfer to Western Connecticut State University in Danbury and get a degree in business or marketing. Krynska feels she qualifies as an immigrant in good standing.

Her lawyer, Crescenzo DeLuca, sent in paperwork to have her case reopened, but in September, Krynska was notified her appeal was denied. DeLuca could not be reached for comment. The Krynskas said he was very diligent about letting them know the consequences of Paulina signing the deportation agreement.

Krynska came to the U.S. to join her parents who had settled here in 1998. Her parents wanted to get established before bringing her over. But when Krynska was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes and spent three weeks in a Warsaw hospital, her mother decided she should come to the U.S. as soon as possible.

"I was little, and obviously an 11-year-old isn't going to understand the immigration system," Krynska said. "I had no clue what was going on. I thought, I'm moving to this country, I'm going to be with my parents, I'm going to be happy."

Krynska and her parents have stayed in the country on various extended visas and has applied for a green card more than once, but her application was always rejected. Her family said they got bad advice from previous immigration lawyers.

It's not uncommon for immigrants to be swindled by lawyers who prey on their lack of knowledge about the complex immigration system, said Wayne Chapple, director of immigration services at the International Institute of Connecticut and a private immigration attorney.

Krynska has many concerns about returning to Poland. She is worried that if she is deported, it will be difficult for her to afford insulin and blood tests for her diabetes care. Also, Krynska said she can speak Polish, but cannot read or write in the language, so it would be difficult for her to attend school or find a job.

Krynska has only enrolled in two classes this semester -- English and U.S. history-- because she does not want to pay too much in tuition if she will have to leave.

Krynska's friend, Sarah Magilnick, has started an online petition to garner support for her case. She has collected letters from friends and acquaintances on Krynska's behalf. On Wednesday, she planned to mail copies of the letters to 20 state officials including U.S. Rep. Jim Himes and U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal.

"I'm usually the type of person who sits back and lets people be pushed around, but it would be like losing a sister if she has to leave," Magilnick said. "I know she's so happy here and everything she has is here. It's like helping family."

Krynska said she got advice from the daughter of Tomasz Kocab, another Polish immigrant in Monroe who was on the verge of removal, to contact U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., because he was able to help her family.

"What we want to get out of it is to reopen my case and see if I do qualify under the new policy," Krynska said. "I do want to stay here and go to school. Maybe they can give me a student visa and give me a green card."

While Krynska is pinning her hopes on Obama's new immigration policy, Chapple says she shouldn't count on it to help her because it is not yet an official policy and could change.

Chapple said at best, all Krynska could hope for is an extension of her deportation case so she could go to court with her parents.

"You never know about new immigration laws, and let's face it, no one is agreeing on anything in Washington and immigration is not a high priority when you're looking at jobs, economy, and the national budget."

But there have been various cases around the country that have been excused under the new order.

ICE would not comment on Krynska's case.

"In accordance with the DHS privacy policy, in most immigration cases ... ICE will not discuss specifics except to confirm a detainer, arrest or removal of an alien," ICE spokesman Chuck Jackson said.

Krynska's parents are scheduled to appear in court in May. Their lawyer told them they have a better chance of being allowed to stay, since they have been in the country more than 10 years and they have a second daughter, who was born in the U.S. five years ago.

Cousin: Man dies after abandoned by smugglers (AP via KTUL)

2011-10-17T17:08:00.002-04:00

Cousin: Man dies after abandoned by smugglers

NOGALES, Ariz. (AP) - The Border Patrol says that an illegal immigrant has died from exposure in the southern Arizona desert over the weekend and that two others were rescued before succumbing to the heat.

Border Patrol spokesman Brent Cagen said Monday that agents in Nogales found a 26-year-old Mexican man unconscious in the desert on Friday afternoon. He was airlifted to a nearby hospital but died Saturday.

Cagen says the man's cousin was with him and didn't need medical attention.

The cousin told agents that smugglers abandoned the pair when his cousin couldn't keep up.

On Sunday, agents in Casa Grande also saved a 39-year-old woman who was lost in the desert and called 911 and a 38-year-old man suffering from severe dehydration and heat exposure.

Severe stutter mars Jamaican's asylum case in US (AP via Boston Globe)

2011-10-16T21:08:00.003-04:00

Severe stutter mars Jamaican's asylum case in US
By Maryclaire Dale
Associated Press / October 16, 2011

PHILADELPHIA—Derrick Cotterel was a farmworker who came to the United States from Jamaica, picking citrus in Florida and apples in West Virginia for 10 years, before a pay dispute with a landscaping employer led to his arrest last year on robbery charges.

Given his long-expired visa, the arrest landed Cotterel in immigration custody in York, Pa. But judges there struggled for nearly a year to understand his request for political asylum.

Cotterel, 42, speaks a Jamaican patois, or Creole, that might alone be difficult for Americans to grasp. But his speech is further compromised by a severe stutter that makes him nearly impossible to understand.

Nor can he read or write. So many of his thoughts remain trapped inside of him.

"Me can, me can, me can ... " Cotterel once stammered to an immigration judge charged with deciding his case. "I said me can't say what (indiscernible). Please, sir, I say I can't tell you what I want to tell you about."

Unlike criminal defendants, immigration detainees like Cotterel have no right to free counsel. So Cotterel sat in the York County Prison, where about 700 detained immigrants are housed with 1,700 convicted or suspected criminals, from July 2010 until May while frustrated judges continued his bail and asylum hearings.

One judge tried to toss him only yes-or-no questions about his political asylum claim, and asked Cotterel to raise his left or right hand, depending on his response.

On May 18, Judge Andrew Arthur tried another tack. He asked two fellow inmates from Jamaica to translate. That worked to a point, though Arthur was not always sure whose answer was being relayed to him.

One inmate-translator told the judge that police had failed to investigate the killing of Cotterel's brother "because of the political activity."

"Did he say that or did you say that?" Arthur asked.

York immigration lawyer Craig R. Shagin is frequently asked to take cases pro bono, but can only take a few, and chooses those he thinks have merit. He recently agreed to help Cotterel -- who lost his asylum bid -- with his appeal. He believes his client could be killed if he returns to Jamaica.

"These types of cases, you basically have death-penalty consequences while employing traffic-court procedures. It's very frightening," Shagin said.

------

Immigrants have every right to hire counsel or find pro bono lawyers to take their cases, noted spokeswoman Elaine Komis of the U.S. Executive Office for Immigration Review. And immigrant aid groups get government funding to inform detainees of their rights.

But few have the money to hire lawyers, and there are a finite number of immigration lawyers near York, which is two hours west of Philadelphia. So 84 percent of detained immigrants go it alone, according to Angela Eveler, director of the Pennsylvania Immigration Resource Center in York.

"The need for legal services in the immigration detention system far outweighs the capacity of nonprofit legal services organizations. It has become a legal and humanitarian crisis," Eveler said.

Judge Arthur, who presided over most of Cotterel's hearings, had called the American Civil Liberties Union on May 10 -- as he delayed another hearing -- to ask them to represent him.

The ACLU has a single immigration lawyer in York, Valerie Burch, who works out of her home. The ACLU agreed to file a friend-of-the-court brief that argues for the government to provide lawyers to disabled immigrants, based on fairness and disability law. The group has a similar class-action lawsuit pending in California that seeks to guarantee lawyers for mentally ill immigrants.

In Cotterel's case, they also want the government to provide a speech professional to determine whether an electronic device or other tools could help him communicate to the court.

"Mr. Cotterel found himself ordered removed from the United States at a hearing that he could not meaningfully participate in," the ACLU wrote.

------

Cotterel, a brawny man, has supported himself mostly as a farmer and fisherman -- jobs that don't require communication skills. In Jamaica, he lived with his brother for a time, until the brother was killed.

"He told me he never gotten government benefits. He has always supported himself," Burch said. "He takes great pride in that."

After exhausting exchanges between Cotterel, Arthur and the two inmate-translators on May 18, Cotterel disclosed that two brothers had been killed in what he deemed politically fueled violence. His family belonged to the Peoples' National Party, and one brother handed out government contracts, he said.

Cotterel said he himself was injured and scarred in a 1998 machete attack. He said he fears being killed.

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement lawyer, Jeffrey T. Bubier, was sympathetic, according to a hearing transcript.

"If I was him, I would be afraid of going back to Jamaica too, but I don't think he's established that more likely than not he's going to be persecuted on account of any political opinions," Bubier argued, citing the standard for asylum relief. "And (he) certainly hasn't established that the government of Jamaica is going to torture him."

Arthur concluded that Cotterel had testified credibly. But he was unconvinced of the political violence claim, and denied the asylum bid.

However, the judge seemed unsure of whether the "translators" amounted to a proper accommodation, and agreed to certify an appeal to the Bureau of Immigration Appeals.

------

This past week, ICE lawyers notified Shagin that they will not oppose the motion for another asylum hearing. The Bureau of Immigration Appeals will ultimately make that call.

Arthur had set bail at $1,500, but Cotterel's friends in Martinsburg, W.Va., have so far scraped together just $900.

And now, there's another hiccup to overcome: Cotterel was recently moved to state custody in West Virginia because he missed a court date in the robbery case while he was incarcerated in York. He has no prior convictions.

According to Shagin, the case stems from an argument that ensued when the landscaper, who was also Cotterel's landlord, came to the apartment and said he wasn't going to pay him.

"You take for granted how valuable the ability to speak is until you don't have it," Shagin said. "It's particularly bad if you don't have it and you're being accused. You're unable to give your side of the story."

Cotterel has now spent 15 months behind bars.

"You can imagine how hard it is to be in a criminal prison, and having a handicap," Shagin said. "It makes you very vulnerable."

Broken promises: Undocumented immigrants are an easy target for dubious services (Chicago Reporter)

2011-10-15T22:16:00.002-04:00

Broken promises: Undocumented immigrants are an easy target for dubious services.

By: Maria Ines Zamudio / October 14, 2011

After spending 12 days in an immigration detention center, Mario De la Rosa received welcomed news about his pending deportation case.

Within three days of his release, Margaret Carrasco, who De la Rosa said introduced herself as an immigration attorney, went to the family’s house to talk about the case. Carrasco promised not only to cancel his deportation but also to help the entire family to obtain legal residency.

Carrasco said she would initially charge $500.

“She gave me faith and made me feel secure about the future,” De la Rosa’s partner, Clara, said in Spanish. “I saw her like an angel.”

On March 26, Carrasco represented De la Rosa in his first immigration court hearing. She later filled out a political asylum application and gave it to De la Rosa, telling him to hand-deliver it to the judge at his second hearing.

Carrasco failed to attend the May 6 hearing, saying she was sick. As instructed, De la Rosa handed in the application, but the judge summarily denied it for having no basis for political asylum.

The judge told De la Rosa that Carrasco wasn’t a lawyer and advised him to go to the National Immigrant Justice Center for proper representation.

“I felt really bad. I was frustrated. How is it possible that she deceived us like this?” De la Rosa said. “We left court thinking, ‘What are we going to do? I don’t have the money to pay someone else, and what if they do the same thing to us?’”

On Oct. 14, the Illinois Attorney General’s Office file a lawsuit against Carrasco alleging that she posed “as a licensed attorney” and “cheated immigrants out of their upfront payments and put them at risk for deportation.”

“Because the immigration process is so complex and consumers are often desperate for help, the environment is ripe for scam artists,” Attorney General Lisa Madigan said in a press release. “This defendant completely misled consumers who needed help, taking their money and putting them at great risk for deportation.”

De la Rosa’s story is one of the many cases of dubious immigration services exploiting helpless immigrants unfamiliar with the country’s judicial system.

Few researchers have been able to quantify the precise extent of the problem over the years. But a 2004 study published in the Georgetown Immigration Law Journal found that at least tens of thousands across the country are defrauded every year.

The Immigrant’s Legal Needs Survey, conducted in 1996, found that two-thirds of noncitizens rely upon personal sources of information to find a legal service provider, and that noncitizens who turn to notarios, or public notaries, are not fluent in English. The study also found that about half of those obtaining help from notarios are living in the country illegally and more vulnerable to fraud.

Despite the paucity of data, the issue has received attention of public officials. In 2004, for example, then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich signed into law a measure that prohibits a notary public, unless he or she is a lawyer, from accepting fees for immigration advice.

And, in June, the Federal Trade Commission, along with several other government agencies, launched an initiative to crack down on these crimes.

Anna Law, associate professor at DePaul University and immigration law expert, said immigrants, especially undocumented ones, are an ideal target for scam artists. “You are dealing with a vulnerable population,” Law said. “We are talking about people who don’t have a lot of money. The lack of education is also an issue.”

“A good lawyer will tell the client what the chances of winning are” before charging or taking a case, said Reid Trautz, director of the Practice and Professionalism Center at the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “Some want to take advantage. They will take the money even though the chance of success is small. A good lawyer will say, ‘There is nothing you can do. Save your money.’”

Since 2002, the office has filed 10 lawsuits involving fraudulent immigration services, including the one filed against Carrasco in October.

But immigration experts say most immigration fraud goes unreported.

“They are trying to avoid detention. They are not going to go to the police,” Law said, adding that they are afraid the person who defrauded them could alert the immigration agency about them.

Law said the chances for immigration fraud tend to increase whenever there’s a surge in deportation cases, as seen after the 2008 implementation of the Secure Communities program, which is designed to share fingerprints of those arrested by local law enforcement agencies with federal immigration authorities.

Since fiscal year 2007, the number of deportations jumped nationally by 35 percent to 392,862 cases in fiscal year 2010.

“The potential for fraud is always there because this area of law is so complex,” Law explained. “But every time there is a change in the law or a new policy, there are new opportunities for scam artists.”

For her part, Carrasco denies all the allegations against her. She says she only identifies herself as a legal representative. “I present myself as Margaret Carrasco; never do I say that I am licensed,” she said. “I make it very, very clear.”

But Carrasco’s business card could be confusing and misleading to immigrants. It has a Loyola Law School logo on the upper left-hand side, and underneath her name it reads, “Graduate of Loyola Law School Jurisprudence 2003.” It also mentions the Chicago Bar Association and the American Immigration Lawyers Association and advises in Spanish, “Don’t sign anything” to anyone arrested or under deportation.

The Loyola Office of Registrar confirmed that Carasco graduated in 2003, but she is not a current member of either the Chicago Bar Association or the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

She is not licensed to practice law in Illinois, according to Jim Grogan, deputy administrator and chief counsel for the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission of the Illinois Supreme Court.

Carrasco said she didn’t get her license to practice law because after graduating from law school, she faced family problems, including the death of her brother-in-law. She said she doesn’t have to be licensed because she is only a legal representative and works with attorneys and nonprofits. She declined to state with whom she works.

“I know sometimes there is confusion because maybe in Spanish, if you have a degree, they call you licenciada,” she said. “I know it happens. I have a person here in Waukegan that I can’t tell you how many times I tell her, ‘I’m not an attorney,’ she always keeps calling me abogada.” Both words can be used interchangeably in Spanish to mean “attorney.”

But Carrasco was listed under “attorney name” in 40 cases at the Chicago immigration court between March 2010 and June 2011, according to records from the Executive Office for Immigration Review.

Eight of those cases resulted in deportation or “voluntary departure,” while the rest of the cases are still pending, the records show.

* * *

De la Rosa’s family moved to Waukegan in 1999.

“We came here hoping to find a cure” for their son, who is disabled and often has seizures, Clara said. “Now, I know that my son will never recover but I thank God that he is stable. If we had stayed in Mexico, he would not be alive.”

De la Rosa is the sole provider for the family. Clara stays home to take care of her son, who can’t speak or walk on his own and eats through a feeding tube.

“If I take him back to Mexico and it is sad to say, but the reality is that if I take him back to Mexico he will die,” she said.

De la Rosa’s trouble with criminal law began in 2003, when he was sentenced to a yearlong probation for driving without a driver’s license. This triggered a deportation proceeding against him, eventually leading to his “voluntary departure” to Mexico.

But then De la Rosa decided to re-enter the country illegally in April 2003 because his son was undergoing surgery. “I couldn’t leave them,” he said about his four children.

Then, on Feb. 11, De la Rosa was arrested for driving with only one functioning headlight. A Waukegan police officer asked for his driver’s license and proof of insurance. He had neither.

According to the police report, the officer also found an arrest warrant that had been issued against De la Rosa for violating the terms of his 2003 probation. His current attorney, Mony Ruiz-Velasco, director of legal services at National Immigrant Justice Center, said the violation was a result of his “voluntary departure,” which came three months before the end of his probation.

Clara said when she contacted Carrasco, the family was desperate. She got her phone number from a friend, who knew Carrasco through her work as an immigration activist.

Carrasco had been making a name for herself as an immigration activist in Waukegan. She organized a protest to oppose the 287(g) program, for which the Waukegan Police Department had applied to receive resources for enforcing immigration laws. She also led a campaign against a city ordinance, passed in 2002, that mandates towing the cars of undocumented immigrants.

Carrasco describes herself as one of the most outspoken immigration activists in Waukegan. She was a member of the Waukegan School District 60 Board of Trustees and ran for mayor in 1997.

Carrasco said her decision to advise De la Rosa to file for political asylum came based on the judge’s suggestion. “It was the judge who stated that day in court to apply for this form of relief, not me,” Carrasco said. She claimed that she could show the court transcript to prove her claim but, despite numerous requests, failed to provide it.

Once Ruiz-Velasco took over De la Rosa’s case, she told him he could file a consumer complaint against Carrasco and guided him through the process. He filed the complaint on Aug. 25.

Two years earlier, an immigration attorney also filed a complaint with the Consumer Fraud Division against Carrasco noting that she was an unauthorized practitioner of law and potentially committing fraud in and around Waukegan.

“Carrasco is performing an unauthorized practice of law and ultimately committing fraud by taking advantage of a disenfranchised segment of society,” wrote the attorney, whose name was redacted from the complaint.

The attorney also submitted a copy of a letter Carrasco sent to her clients promising immigrants the “American dream” of becoming a citizen along with a list of required information.

“She is mucking us … just because we are undocumented,” Clara said. “She’s just a scam artist.”

Other alleged victims of Carrasco say they are too afraid to file an official complaint.

In April, Carrasco charged a 43-year-old woman and a 28-year-old man $500 each to start the process of canceling their deportation proceedings.

The woman, who declined to be named for this story for fear of retaliation, described in tears how she was arrested by immigration agents for using someone else’s Social Security number. After she was released from custody, she contacted Carrasco, who went to her house to talk about the case and allegedly promised to cancel the deportation—and even apply for a humanitarian visa, she said.

The woman paid the $500, after finding a part-time job and saving the money for five weeks. On May 3, Carrasco went to her first court appearance, where the woman was ordered to go back to court on May 15, 2012. “After court, [Carrasco] congratulated me and said, ‘You see, everything is going to be fine,’” she said.

But then her friend called her to tell her that Carrasco was not a lawyer. The woman fell deeper into depression. She is taking anti-depressants and can’t sleep at night. She said she hasn’t been able to get in touch with Carrasco since the court hearing.

About filing a complaint against Carrasco, she said, “I’m afraid of the problems it might bring me.”

The man across town is in the same situation. He was arrested after he was accused of selling false identification cards. The criminal case was resolved when he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and was sentenced to one year of probation. Then he was transferred to immigration custody. His wife paid Carrasco $500 to cancel his deportation case, but the couple said they haven’t been able to get a hold of her since then.

“I felt bad. I was counting on her,” he said. “I don’t have money to hire another attorney. If she did this to me, she will do it to other” immigrants facing deportation.

Calls Lead To Man's Release From ICE Center (WDIV-MI)

2011-10-15T22:12:00.002-04:00

Calls Lead To Man's Release From ICE Center
October 14, 2011

A Michigan Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center has released Francisco Ascencio after more than 600 calls for justice on his behalf. The release followed a campaign launched by a coalition of immigration rights advocates and the Alliance for Immigrants Rights and Reform Michigan.

A Michigan native for more than 13 years, Ascencio was detained by ICE following a routine traffic stop and spent seven weeks in an ICE facility away from his wife and three children. On Wednesday, AIR launched an email and social media campaign asking supporters to contact ICE, members of congress and/or President Barack Obama to demand relief for Ascensio. By Thursday, over 600 calls and messages resulted in Ascensio’s release.

ICE has stated they will hold off action on his case for one year, but after that his fate it unknown.

In August, the Obama administration announced a new deportation relief policy, which concentrates resources on prosecuting and deporting criminals. The move played a key part in the online campaign for Ascencio’s release; he has no criminal record. Despite the new policy which seeks to concentrate deportation efforts on criminals, families like Ascensios are still being torn apart, since new guidelines have not been released.

Although Ascencio has been reunited with his family, he can’t work or provide for them and his wife hasn’t found work in the past seven weeks. Their future remains uncertain until true reforms are made.

Long, risky road leads to heartache for Coconut Creek immigrant family (South Florida Sun-Sentinel)

2011-10-15T21:56:00.002-04:00

Long, risky road leads to heartache for Coconut Creek immigrant family
Teen split from parents after deportations

Michael Mayo
Sun Sentinel Columnist
3:14 p.m. EDT, October 15, 2011

Nearly 18 years after arriving in the United States and six weeks after federal immigration agents raided her family's Coconut Creek home, Shamsun Nahar's American dream ended with tears and heart-piercing wails.

Before dawn Friday, she peeled herself away from a final hug with her son Simon, 14, and daughter Nadia Sultana, 22, then disappeared down a corridor atFort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

Nahar, 43, took a three-flight journey back to her native Bangladesh. There, she joined her husband, Mohammed Rafiuddin, and 19-year-old son, Emon, who were deported last month.

"My life is gone," Emon, formerly a student at Palm Beach State College, told me in a phone interview from Bangladesh.

The parents and two eldest children came to South Florida to visit relatives in 1994. They didn't leave after their bid for asylum was denied. Nahar said things became complicated when Simon was born — in Plantation, making him a U.S. citizen — with a heart defect.

Decades later, things unraveled quickly. The family said it began with a 6 a.m. knock on the door on Aug. 31, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents seizing the parents and Emon. Nahar was released so that she could take care of Simon, but she agreed to leave the country by Friday.

ICE spokesman Nestor Yglesias said the family agreed to voluntary departure in 1997 but failed to comply. He said the family's arrest and deportation was "consistent with ICE's priorities."

Perhaps the get-tough-on-illegal-immigration crowd will cheer a story like this.

But up close, watching this family get torn apart last week was simply brutal.

And it doesn't seem to jibe with the Obama administration's stated policy of "prosecutorial discretion" when it comes to deportations, with priority given to criminals and national security threats. Rafiuddin, who ran a Pompano Beach convenience store, had only a minor criminal blemish, pleading no contest to selling cigarettes to a minor in 1998.

The family breakup also doesn't seem to make much sense, with Simon (a high school freshman) separated from his parents, Emon uprooted from his education and friends, and Nadia (a green-card holder who now lives in Daytona Beach) thrust into the role of caretaker for her younger brother.

Barring a change in policy or special dispensation, the parents and Emon will not be allowed to return for 10 years.

After the anguished airport goodbye, Nadia went to the Broward County Courthouse to get custody of Simon so he could enroll at a Daytona Beach school.

My intent isn't to paint the family as victims, but to show the parents as human beings who broke the law for the most understandable of reasons — their kids. "We just wanted a better life for our family," Nahar told me.

They made a whopper of a miscalculation: That they could get away with staying here forever.

The family's abrupt departure will leave a ghost house in an upscale subdivision. Over the last decade, Rafiuddin and Nahar paid roughly $70,000 in property taxes on the home they bought for $278,000 in 2001, according to county records. Even with three kids going through public schools, that's hardly being a sponge on society.

Like many South Floridians, the family had recent financial problems. Saddled with credit card and other debt, the parents filed for bankruptcy in 2010. The family seemed to live large: The four-bedroom house was loaded with nice furniture and all the American luxuries, like a big-screen TV.

Now the house is empty and likely headed to foreclosure, the furnishings shipped to Bangladesh.

Call that gaming the system if you want. But in this case, nobody wins.

South side neighborhood evacuated after bomb scare (Arizona Daily Star)

2011-10-15T21:53:00.002-04:00

South side neighborhood evacuated after bomb scare

Arizona Daily Star | Posted: Saturday, October 15, 2011 3:13 pm

Residents in a southside neighborhood were evacuated Friday night while the Tucson Police Department bomb squad investigated a suspicious package found in a mobile home.

Officers were called to a trailer court in the 5900 block of South Stewart Boulevard just before 9 p.m. after receiving a report of shots being fired at one of the trailers.

Officers found shell casings outside the home, said Sgt. Matt Ronstadt, a TPD spokesman. Inside they found about 25 undocumented immigrants. No gunshot victims were found, but during a search of the premises, officers discovered a suspicious package and the bomb squad was called in. They remained on-site into the early morning hours. Agents from the U.S. Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement joined the investigation.

About seven homes in the area were evacuated and SunTran brought in a bus where the displaced residents could wait out the investigation.

Bomb squad personnel determined the object to be a mock explosive device and destroyed the package, Ronstadt said in a news release.

Border Patrol and ICE interviewed the immigrants at the scene before taking them to a federal facility for further processing.

Tucson police detectived determined that there was a fight between a group of people outside of the home before the shots were fired.

Detectives were still trying to figure out if the group was affiliated with the mobile home.

New deportation policy hasn't trickled down to BP (Tucson Sentinel)

2011-09-08T11:17:00.001-04:00

New deportation policy hasn't trickled down to BP
ICE memo urged that cases be considered carefully

Posted Sep 7, 2011, 10:42 am

Julian Aguilar
The Texas Tribune

When Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced in June it was urging prosecutors to use discretion when placing illegal immigrants in deportation proceedings, skeptics urged caution. We’ve heard this before, they claimed.

People like Roxann Lara give them one more reason to say they were right.

Lara, originally from Delicias, Chihuahua, is five months pregnant and the mother of two U.S. citizen children. She is in the country illegally because she overstayed a visa. Her attorney says she’s the “poster child” for leniency under the June directive.

Instead, Lara was detained and processed by immigration authorities in Anthony, N.M., last week after she admitted to having expired documents when local police and U.S. Border Patrol agents came to the door looking for her sister.

It means the “left hand isn’t aware of what the right hand is doing,” said Carlos Spector, Lara’s El Paso-based attorney. "I think it’s important to note that this [directive] has not reached the lowest levels of ICE... because [Border Patrol agents] are still picking up pregnant women."

In the June directive, ICE Director John Morton told prosecutors to evaluate several factors when determining which illegal immigrants to place in deportation proceedings, part of a plan to concentrate ICE’s finite resources on removing the most dangerous criminal aliens. These factors included the immigrant’s health, their children’s immigration status, how long they had been in the country, and whether or not they were “low profile” — the government’s term for non-violent, non-essential deportees.

That memo was followed last month by an announcement that the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE and Customs and Border Protection, would review the cases of the 300,000 people currently in deportation proceedings to determine if any should be released and subsequently allowed to apply for work authorization

Lara was released from detention, but not until she was hospitalized after becoming panic stricken and physically ill during her stay. She says an agent threatened to deport her to Ciudad Juárez, where drug cartel violence is widespread.

“He said, ‘We have to go get your kids.’ I said ‘No, do what you want with me but leave my kids alone,’” a sobbing Lara told the Tribune by telephone from El Paso. “I told him I was sick and he said it didn’t matter to him.”

Spector said despite Lara's release, she has been issued a notice to appear before a judge. He said he intends to ask the judge to dismiss the case based on the Morton memo.

“The new policy says they shouldn’t pick up pregnant women or sick people," Spector said. "What we want to see and ask is, what does the Border Patrol think of the Morton memo?”

When asked if the Border Patrol has amended its policies since the Morton memo was issued, a spokesman for the U.S. Border Patrol El Paso sector told the Tribune agents are required to detain anyone who is unauthorized to be in the country. They can't give out warnings the way police officers can, he said; the immigration courts are the ones that ultimately make the decisions.

In Lara's case, Agent Ramiro Cordero said, Border Patrol "did exactly what we were supposed to do. If the courts grant that person some type of legal document, then the system works." Cordero added that the Morton memo was directed at federal prosecutors, who are overseen by ICE. U.S. Border Patrol, he said, is under the purview of Customs and Border Protection.

"Until there is policy and guidance from DHS, we still do what we have to do," he said.

'Not a revolutionary concept'
By the government’s own admission, internal policy changes can be slow-going. The agency's plan for reviewing deportation cases is still being crafted, so no individual cases have been closed, according to a Department of Homeland Security spokesman who asked not to be identified.

Immigration policy experts say they’re not surprised that there hasn’t been an immediate and sweeping change in policy. The Morton memo doesn’t reinvent the system, they say.

“Prosecutorial discretion is not new. It’s not a revolutionary concept," said Muzaffar Chishti, an attorney and director of the Migration Policy Institute at the New York University School of Law. "In an immigration context there have been guidelines about discretion for a very long time.”

A prosecutorial discretion memo issued in November 2000 by then-Immigration and Naturalization Services Commissioner Doris Meissner, now a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute, said the agency had finite resources, and prosecuting all immigration cases was “not possible.” It instructed prosecutors to consider immigrants' criminal history, immigration history, cooperation with authorities, military service and humanitarian concerns, like conditions in the peron's home country and their health.

But when the Morton memo was issued in June, it still caused an uproar among Republican hardliners like U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio, who called it “backdoor amnesty” and introduced a still-pending bill to dilute the administration’s immigration enforcement powers.

What's different about the agency's current policy, Chishti said, is that the government has stated it will review pending cases, not just use new standards for future ones. But he said it’s unclear how these policies will be implemented at the local level.

“The most critical part of this policy is going to be how they monitor it in the field,” Chishti said. “How are you going to notify people... and what is the accountability if an officer chooses not to exercise the discretion on the basis of the guidelines?"

Lara’s case indicates that, at least in certain Border Patrol sectors, the jury is still out.

Local immigrant won't be deported (Winston-Salem Journal)

2011-09-08T11:11:00.002-04:00

Local immigrant won't be deported
By: BERTRAND M. GUTIERREZ | Winston-Salem Journal
Published: September 07, 2011

Federal authorities have opted not to initiate deportation proceedings against Yadkin County resident Martin Rodriguez and at least six other immigrants arrested during a rally in Charlotte this week, immigration attorneys and jail officials said Wednesday.

But Rodriguez, who is not authorized to be in the United States, remained in the Mecklenburg County Jail on Wednesday evening on misdemeanor charges related to the rally because he refused to sign paperwork for his own release, said jail officials, citing a note in Rodriguez's file from the magistrate.

It is unclear why Rodriguez refused to sign the paperwork. His sister, Silvia Rodriguez, 18, who heard about her brother's refusal from a reporter, guessed that he may have done it as a sign of solidarity with others who were arrested.

"Do you know if everyone is getting released? It could be that he doesn't want to come out until everyone comes out," she said.

Martin Rodriguez, 20, was one of 15 protesters arrested Tuesday after they and a crowd of about 300 protesters held a sit-in rally near Central Piedmont Community College. Most were initially charged with misdemeanor disorderly conduct and impeding traffic, police said.

If Rodriguez does not sign paperwork to get out of jail, he could stay there until his misdemeanor charges are heard in court. A court date was not available Wednesday afternoon on the jail website.

His immigration status and misdemeanor charges are separate matters because being in the U.S. without authorization is a civil offense, not a criminal offense, and it is handled by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Ivan Ortiz-Delgado, an ICE spokesman, explained why the federal agency sometimes opts not to detain illegal immigrants.

"ICE is focused on sensible, effective immigration enforcement that prioritizes efforts first on those serious criminal aliens who present the greatest risk to the security of our communities, not sweeps or raids to target undocumented immigrants indiscriminately," Ortiz-Delgado said in an email.

Following a directive written in a letter dated June 17 from ICE Director John Morton and publicly supported by President Barack Obama last month, the immigration agency has been exercising prosecutorial discretion on a case-by-case basis.

Helen Parsonage, a Winston-Salem immigration attorney helping with some of the cases, said ICE's decision to forgo deportation proceedings against Rodriguez is a sign that the Morton letter is filtering through the agency.

"This is a huge sea change to me — to see undocumented migrants being arrested and not put in deportation proceedings is such a relief, especially after the last couple of years when people have been deported after being in a traffic stop," Parsonage said. "Finally, there seems to be some sanity and balance about who we deport and who we don't."

Rodriguez was a good student, is an active church member and had never gotten in trouble with the law, according to his priest and former teachers.

"He was a well-above-average student — almost had 100 average in the class I taught, which was an upper-level math class," said Stephen Brown, his teacher at Starmount High School in Boonville.

Principal Junior Luffman echoed that sentiment.

"He was never a problem in school. He didn't get in any trouble. He was very respectful and followed the rules," he said.

The Rev. Jose Enrique Gonzalez, who is the pastor at Divine Redeemer Parish in Boonville, said in Spanish that Rodriguez does a lot of work with the church's youth group.

"I hope he can fix his situation, and I hope I can see him back at church soon," Gonzalez said. "He is doing this not just for himself but for others who are also going through the same challenges."

The rally and subsequent arrests were aimed at raising awareness about immigrants such as Rodriguez, who was brought to the U.S. from Mexico as a toddler and has grown up here. They want Congress to pass legislation known as the Dream Act, which would allow young, educated immigrants to correct their immigration status and go to college or join the military.

Ten of the 15 arrested are not authorized to be in the U.S., according to the N.C. Dream Team, the advocacy group that organized the rally.

Parsonage was helping with seven of the immigration cases. On Wednesday evening, it was still unclear whether ICE officials had opened deportation proceedings against the other three immigrants.

Charge dismissed in Hailey stabbing case (Idaho Mountain Express)

2011-09-07T10:27:00.003-04:00

Charge dismissed in Hailey stabbing case
Defendant released from jail to immigration agents
By TERRY SMITH
Express Staff Writer

A jury trial was scheduled to begin Tuesday in Blaine County 5th District Court on a Hailey stabbing case, but the charge of aggravated battery was dismissed against the defendant late last week.

But for Alberto Romero-Torres, a 21-year-old former Hailey resident, that doesn't mean he was released from jail. Instead, he was turned over Tuesday to the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency because it had filed an immigration detainer on him when he was arrested in March.

"When a charge is dismissed and a detainer is in place, the detainer is still valid," Blaine County Jail Administrator Lt. Jay Davis said Tuesday.

The reason for the dismissal is not clear and the Blaine County Prosecuting Attorney's Office declined Tuesday to elaborate.

The case against Romero-Torres arose on March 13 when Hailey police were called to St. Luke's Wood River Medical Center to investigate what appeared to be stab and slash wounds on 21-year-old Erika M. Ruiz, who police reported was living with Romero-Torres at the Balmoral apartment complex in Hailey.

A probable-cause affidavit filed in March by Hailey Patrolman Shane Manning states that he interviewed Ruiz at the hospital and she told him she was stabbed in the stomach and slashed on the arm by Romero-Torres during an argument earlier that day. Later that month, Ruiz testified before a Blaine County grand jury, leading to an indictment against Romero-Torres on a charge of aggravated battery.

Romero-Torres had been incarcerated in the Blaine County jail since his arrest on March 17. Hailey police reported then that he voluntarily turned himself in after he found out an arrest warrant had been issued for him.

Though a no-contact order was issued against Romero-Torres, prohibiting him from talking to Ruiz, the couple had allegedly been having telephone conversations while he was in jail.

On Aug. 26, Ruiz was arrested on a felony charge of unauthorized use of a financial transaction card, which police allege she used to transfer funds to the jail telephone account of Romero-Torres and another jail inmate.

Days later, the case against Romero-Torres was dropped. A motion to dismiss filed on Aug. 29 by the Prosecuting Attorney's Office states that a "post-indictment investigation has revealed evidence that seriously calls into question the events leading to the indictment."

"This evidence has led to the state's decision that the dismissal would serve the ends of justice," the motion states.

Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Matt Fredback declined to elaborate to the Idaho Mountain Express on why the charges were dropped and what might have happened the night Ruiz went to the hospital.

"The motion to dismiss is going to have to speak for itself," Fredback wrote in an email. "I do not believe it is appropriate to provide further explanation for the dismissal."

Hailey attorney Keith Roark was assigned to represent Romero-Torres in the stabbing case under the Roark Law Firm's public defender contract with Blaine County.

Deportation splits family (The Spectrum)

2011-09-07T10:02:00.001-04:00

Deportation splits family
Cedar City businessman sent away; wife, 5 kids left without income

Nur Kausar
9:09 AM, Sep. 7, 2011

A two-day fugitive operation by Immigration and Customs Enforcement went smoothly for the agency in Southern Utah last month, but it also painfully disrupted the livelihood of at least one family that is now trying its hardest to reunite.

ICE Fugitive Operations officers arrested Augusto Raymundo Jesus, 38, at his Cedar City home in front of his wife, Kacie, and five children, leaving them without a breadwinner. Jesus was deported Aug. 30 to Guatemala, returning to the country he left 22 years ago.

According to the ICE website, Fugitive Operations Teams like the one in Southern Utah last month started in 2003 to dramatically expand the agencys efforts to locate, arrest and remove fugitives from the United States. ICE officers arrested 18 others during the two-day blitz. Nine had prior criminal convictions, and 13 had outstanding orders of removal from the country.

Jesus had both, making him a priority when the operation occurred, said Virginia Kice, ICE western regional communications director and spokesperson.

Kacie says ICE should have taken a case-by-case approach to the arrests, as her husband had a family to take care of, ran a contracting business, paid his taxes, hired employees and obeyed all laws in the 13 years she knew him.

"While we both believe in obeying the laws it is inhumane and cruel to just take a father and husband away unannounced when he is the sole support to (six) American citizens," Kacie said in a message. "The government now has to support Rays family (us). There are a lot of bad illegals here that need to be deported, not Ray. This is not a smart solution for this problem."

However, according to ICE, Jesus did not obey the law before he got married in 2001, and it came back to bite him.

In 1993, an immigration judge in San Diego found that Jesus had no legal basis to remain in the United States and gave him 90 days to leave the country, Kice said.

Jesus appealed the judges decision to the Board of Immigration Appeals, and in 1998, the board upheld the lower courts decision and gave Jesus 30 days to voluntarily depart, she said. "When he failed to do so, he became subject to a final order of removal."

Misdemeanor convictions, including two DUIs, did not help his case, and now Jesus options might be to wait until he is eligible to apply for legal entry to the United States or for his children to sponsor him when one turns 21 Ñ in 10 years.

Kacie said her husband never received the boards notice to her knowledge, and Jesus was under the impression that he could remain here legally until 2004.

Kacie noted she and Jesus tried to seek citizenship for him in 2004 but were told by an attorney that because of his order for removal, Jesus would have to leave the United States for one year, return to Guatemala, apply to return and still only have a 50 percent chance of being allowed back in.

"Hes a good guy. He wouldnt just up and leave his wife and kids," Kacie said, so he stayed, hoping the laws would change and not punish him for his decision to support his family.

Unfortunately, said advocate Luis Espinoza Munoz with Community Aid and Immigrant Services, thats not how the current laws work.

"You have to put all your ducks in a row," Espinoza said. "The nice thing is all the rules are written down, but its cut and dry. And many times, my clients have no idea what to do."

That may have been the case here, Espinoza said, as is with many cases he sees as an immigration advocate for 16 years.

The other problem, Espinoza noted, is the inefficiency of the immigration system. Attorneys sometimes charge upwards of $40,000, unrealistic for some immigrants, and the process itself could take years.

With Jesus criminal record, even if from a distant past, time and money will be needed before he could be reunited with his family.

For now, Kacie said she is in the process of looking for an attorney and for somewhere to live because she is losing her home and is trying to sell her husbands truck. She has not worked in 12 years and stays at home with her children that range in age from 6 months old to 11 years. The couple has an autistic son who requires much of her attention, she said.

Of Jesus, Kacie said, "Hes a mess. He misses his kids. Hes in shock because he has only the clothes on his back."

Jesus reunited with his parents in Guatemala and talks to his wife approximately once a week.

His Cedar City business, Rays Quality Framing, will have to close because his contractor license is up for renewal in November, but he isnt here to renew and employees are already finding other employment, she said.

The Ray Jesus Legal Defense Fund has been set up at State Bank of Utah to help the family with expenses. Donations are accepted at any branch.

Immigrants arrested at 'coming out' rally (Charlotte Observer)

2011-09-07T10:00:00.002-04:00

Immigrants arrested at 'coming out' rally
About 200 people speak out about policies they say discriminate against the undocumented among them.

By Franco Ordoñez
Posted: Wednesday, Sep. 07, 2011

Police arrested at least 10 young illegal immigrants as they blocked traffic near Central Piedmont Community College Tuesday to protest policies they say discriminate against undocumented immigrants.

Nearly 200 people met on CPCC's central campus for a 1 p.m. "coming out" rally in which some protesters publicly announced they're living in the country illegally.

The group then marched around the school toward the intersection of Kings Drive and Fourth Street. The large group proceeded to block all four directions of traffic while chanting "education, not deportation" and "undocumented and unafraid."

As Charlotte-Mecklenburg police converged on the group, seven young people stepped into the middle of the intersection. One 25-year-old from Carrboro grabbed a bullhorn and announced:

"My name is Alicia Torres and I'm risking it all. Today is the day that I am coming out of the shadows and saying I exist. I am no longer going to be afraid. I am no longer going to wait around and watch my mom pray."

Before she could finish, officers encircled Torres, grabbed her arms and handcuffed her.

The protest was the latest in a series of rallies where undocumented students announced their status publicly to raise awareness.

The Tuesday protest was organized by the N.C. Dream Team, a Raleigh-based group of students, most of whom live in the country illegally. They called for passage of the Dream Act - legislation that would provide a path to legalization for some young people brought to the U.S. illegally by their parents. The bill has been introduced several times in Congress without success.

The students are known for their aggressive tactics. They have organized rallies and hunger strikes. They've confronted legislators. This spring, they took part in a similar protest in Atlanta where two of their members were arrested and later released.

A total of 15 people were arrested at the Charlotte demonstration. Police said all were charged with impeding traffic and disorderly conduct. Two were also charged with violation of the noise ordinance.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg police Capt. J.W. Estes said their main goal was to protect the protesters. He said there was no violence and no one was hurt.

"They just wanted to get their point across," he said. "We understand their efforts, but we have to enforce the law. We can't take sides."

According to organizers, the following undocumented students were arrested, in addition to Torres: Angelica Velazquillo, 25, of Charlotte; Manuel Vazquez, 21, of Raleigh; Santiago Garcia, 20, of Asheville; Cynthia Martinez, 20, of Sanford; Viridiana Martinez of Sanford; Martin Rodriguez, 20, of Hamptonville, N.C.; Isabel Castillo, 26, of Harrisonburg, Va.; Mohammad Abdollahi; and Marco Saavedra, 21, of Cincinnati.

All the arrested individuals were taken to the Mecklenburg County Jail for processing. The sheriff's office said individuals identified as being in the country illegally will be turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Advocates for stricter enforcement say giving these students a path to legalization would only give illegal immigrants further incentive to break the nation's laws and create more competition for legal residents.

This will be one of the first chances to see how a new Obama administration policy on illegal immigrants is implemented. The administration announced last month that those without criminal records - who are found to be a low priority because they are students, were brought here as children or have long family ties to the country - would be released and granted work permits.

Organizers of Tuesday's rally said it was not a coincidence that the protest is occurring one year before the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte. Just minutes before she was arrested, Viridiana Martinez said the Democratic Party has given the immigrant community false hope. It needs to be held accountable for failing to follow through with its promises, she said.

Angelica Velazquillo, who graduated from South Mecklenburg High School and Belmont Abbey College, knew she was risking deportation Tuesday. She graduated magna cum laude with a degree in psychology, but says she's can't work in her field because of her status.

Her brother, Erick Velazquillo, was arrested last fall for driving without a valid license. He faced deportation until the N.C. Dream Team launched a public awareness campaign on his behalf. His case was administratively closed, but he could still be deported. He was not given a work permit.

"I'm doing this because I'm tired of hearing wonderful words," she said at the rally. "The reality is, nothing is going to happen. This is a way of reminding our community that we're here. ... If I'm going to be deported, I'm going to do it because of the injustice my community is facing."

Suspected Undocumenteds Detained after Boat Is Spotted Off Leo Carrillo (Malibu Surfside News)

2011-09-01T13:27:00.001-04:00

Suspected Undocumenteds Detained after Boat Is Spotted Off Leo Carrillo

• Ten Taken into Custody Had Scattered in Parkland after Being Dropped Off near the Beach

BY ANNE SOBLE

Eight men and two women who are Mexican nationals were detained last Friday after a boat that may have been engaged in illegal human trafficking was spotted offshore in western Malibu.

An interagency law enforcement investigation got underway at about 8:30 a.m. when an empty 25-foot boat—the type of fishing craft referred to as a panga—washed ashore near Leo Carrillo State Beach.

Pangas have become the vessels of choice for the smuggling of human cargo and drugs along the Southern California coast as illegal land crossing at the Mexican border has become increasingly difficult and dangerous.

The interagency team, including Los Angeles and Ventura county sheriff's departments, state park rangers, local county firefighters, helicopter units and the Ventura office of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency joined the effort.

After several hours of combing the rugged brush in Leo Carrillo State Park, the 10 suspected undocumenteds were found several miles from the beach. They were dehydrated but otherwise had come through 15 hours at sea and what may have been a rough disembarking relatively unscathed.

Although there were reports that there were other passengers loose in the area, no additional people were found.

Last Friday's incident was the sixth in a series of suspected smuggling occurrences reported at or near the Malibu-Ventura County line in recent months.

In July, 15 suspected undocumented immigrants were discovered on Santa Cruz Island, where they reportedly were abandoned by a smuggler.

In late June, a group of suspected undocumenteds was found in Malibu.

In March, suspected smugglers and more than a ton of marijuana were found on Santa Rosa Island after their boat reportedly ran out of gas.

Agency officials decline to speculate how many boat trips are successfully completed.

A dozen or so immigrants and a few crew members is the usual load carried by a boat. Travelers pay as much as $5000-$7000 for the arduous trip on the high seas.

Smugglers will often unload immigrants in dangerous circumstances to avoid being caught with them on board.

ICE has issued alerts asking passersby to call 911 to report suspicious activity along the western Malibu coast. However, the craft often travel without lights, usually arrive in the pre-dawn hours, and may not be readily visible to motorists.

Agency spokespersons indicate that they expect sea smuggling to increase as land border enforcement becomes more stringent.

A major concern is that, in addition to human cargo, there is narcotics trafficking. It has been confirmed that some passengers cover part or all of the pricey journey by acting as mules, or couriers, for drug dealers.

Grand America Hotel fires employees over lack of work documentation (KSTU-UT)

2011-09-01T13:17:00.002-04:00

Grand America Hotel fires employees over lack of work documentation
Reports say layoffs near 120 employees

fox13now.com
8:51 a.m. MDT, September 1, 2011

SALT LAKE CITY—
Some reports say 120 employees have been laid off at the Grand America Hotel after an audit report found several of their workers did not have current validation to work in the United States.

Hotel president Bruce Fery said in a statement Wednesday the Grand America is not alone and audits are being conducted statewide. He says that the employees that were found with invalid documentation had "presented facially valid documents when they were hired."

Fery goes on to say in the statement: "Over the last several months some of those without proper documentation were able to update their information to satisfy DHS and continue their employment. Earlier this month DHS notified the hotel that those who had not been able to document their right to work in the United States could no longer be employed after today."

The hotel is not confirming how many lost their jobs because of the audit.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) issued a statement that could be interpreted as critical of Grand America saying: “Responsible employers who seek to conduct their business lawfully are put at an unfair disadvantage as they try to compete with unscrupulous businesses. Such businesses gain a competitive edge by paying illegal alien workers low wages or otherwise exploiting them.”

The recent layoffs come as Utahns and local politicians are debating whether to allow undocumented workers to remain.

FOX 13 talked with various members of state government and they all say the audit is a federal action.

Mistake raid shocks disabled veteran in San Benito (KGBT-TX)

2011-09-01T12:56:00.002-04:00

Mistake raid shocks disabled veteran in San Benito
by Amber Dixon
Posted: 08.31.2011 at 11:16 PM

Immigration and Customs Enforcement raided the home of disabled veteran Alfredo Lopez last week.

Although they did not find anything, 60-year-old Lopez said the scare he got gave him severe heart palpitations.

He stayed in the hospital two days.

Alfredo Lopez said he was showering when Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents surrounded his home.

He said he got out of his shower and saw an ICE agent outside his bathroom window.

With no shirt on, Lopez shuffled to the front door.

Lopez uses a cane after an aneurysm paralyzed his left side.

“I mean seeing those guys took the breath out of me,” said Lopez.

Lopez said ICE agents were looking for illegal immigrants.

"I said you're welcome to come in and check,” said Lopez. “Because I mean I was surprised. Where in the heck would there be any illegals here?"

Lopez said agents searched every room and even his shed.

He said they came up empty-handed and apologized.

“They need better intelligence,” Lopez said.

The shock of the raid affected Lopez’s health.

“My blood pressure has gone up, and I think I got scared,” said Lopez.

After spending two days in the hospital, Lopez now wears a heart monitor.

In a week, he'll go back to the doctor to make sure his heart is beating at a safe rate.

Lopez said he no longer feels safe in his home.

Action 4 News asked ICE why Lopez's home was raided, and if ICE agents conduct raids differently when a disabled person is involved.

They issued the following statement:

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) welcomes feedback from members of the public, especially regarding their involvement with recent ICE HSI operations.

ICE is able to most efficiently look into complaints when they are brought directly to our attention.

ICE HSI special agents conduct operations on a daily basis based on leads that we receive from various sources.

ICE is committed to conducting safe and secure operations with the public’s welfare being paramount.”

Lopez said his health was not taken into consideration.

Federal deportation review comes too late for some (CNN)

2011-09-01T12:44:00.003-04:00

Federal deportation review comes too late for some
By Sarah Hoye, CNN
September 1, 2011 8:38 a.m. EDT

Philadelphia (CNN) -- Last September, Ana Maria Cruz waited in her minivan outside an immigration office, clutching her fiance's keys, wallet and cell phone.

Cruz, then eight months pregnant and with two of the couple's other children in tow, began to worry when Chally Dang took longer than usual to emerge from what should have been a routine check-in with immigration officials.

"I sat there for about an hour because I didn't know what to do," Cruz said. "Then he collect-called me to say they weren't letting him go."

For the next nine months, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials held Dang and three other Cambodian-Americans -- all legal permanent residents who had come to the United States as child refugees.

In June, they sent Dang to Cambodia. Each of the men detained last September had committed a crime that carried a retroactive removal order. That allows them to be deported at any time, regardless of when the crime was committed.

Dang, now 29, was arrested when he was 15, after he fired an illegal handgun into the air. Although no one was injured, Dang was charged in 1997 with aggravated assault, criminal conspiracy and possessing criminal instruments.

He was sentenced to 5½ years in prison. Despite having served his prison time, under 1996 immigration laws, he could be deported back to Cambodia -- a country he had never seen -- without a hearing in front of an immigration judge.

Dang's situation is not uncommon, and it is becoming part of the growing debate over immigration reform in the United States.

In a move that could shake up the U.S. immigration system, the Department of Homeland Security said the government would review about 300,000 deportation cases pending in federal immigration courts.Lower-priority cases -- those not involving people considered violent or otherwise dangerous -- would be suspended under the new criteria.

Federal authorities are still hashing out details of how the cases will be reviewed, a senior Department of Homeland Security official said last week.

For Cruz and Dang, the announcement comes too late for them to tell their story.

Ana Marie Cruz's fiance, a legal resident and father of her children, was deported for a crime he committed 14 years ago.

Cruz maintains that her fiance -- now a world away in Cambodia -- had turned his life around after serving his time in prison and deserved to stay in the United States."

They should give Americans, refugees and permanent residents who have reformed (themselves) chances to prove that they are of good character, regardless of any mistakes that they have made in their past," she said. "Just because someone made one mistake, especially in their youth, doesn't label them a criminal for life. People change, and people learn."

One of five children, Dang was born in Kamput refugee camp in Thailand, after his parents escaped the "killing fields" in the Southeast Asian nation of Cambodia, where at least 1.7 million people died under the 1970s Khmer Rouge regime.

Shortly after Dang was born, his father separated from his mother while awaiting sponsorship. His family entered the United States in 1983 and settled in crime-ridden North Philadelphia, where his mother remarried and gave birth to her youngest son.

The cash-strapped family moved from apartment to apartment, and a strained home life left him finding solace among other refugee kids in the neighborhood."

Truancy became regular, and schoolwork was out of the question," Dang wrote in a letter on December 4, 2010, while he was being detained in York County Prison. "That's when the downhill became even steeper."

He was expelled multiple times from school for his disruptive behavior and eventually joined an Asian gang.

Dang hit rock bottom in 1997 when a rival gang spotted him and a friend in North Philadelphia. According to Dang, the rivals threw bottles and rocks at the car he was in, and his friend handed him a gun."

I recklessly fired a few rounds in their proximity," he wrote.

Dang spent his high school years behind bars, where he obtained his GED. When he was paroled in 2003, Dang, then 21, was taken into ICE custody and given a final order of deportation.

But Cambodia was not accepting deportees from the U.S., so he was allowed to stay here under ICE supervision. After six months, he was granted supervised release.

"Regret is one of many effusive links composing a chain that binds me to my past," he wrote. "The actions of my past still haunt me."

Vowing never to repeat the mistakes of his past, Dang started a family, earned a living working for a vending company, committed no crimes after his release and regularly checked in with immigration officials.

"It's hard for me because we built a life together, and I feel like it was ripped apart," Cruz said. "It's a life-changing thing."

Cruz, 28, gave birth to the couple's daughter, Farrah, a month after Dang was detained.

Agency officials say immigrants who commit these crimes must be removed even if, like Dang, they have a green card.

Dang's freedom lasted seven years.

Mia-lia Kiernan, who helped launch a Philadelphia grass-roots organization dedicated to keeping immigrant families living together, is at odds with the DHS immigration announcement.

Kiernan and family members of the detained and deported started the One Love Movement to help them fight for individualized reviews of their deportation orders -- including that of Dang.

The very government that gave Dang shelter targeted him and other refugees with criminal histories, Kiernan said.

"People really need to think about the title 'criminal alien' and who gets left behind," she said. "We're creating a generation of young people forced to grow up without parents."

By law, deportation is mandatory for anyone not a U.S. citizen who commits an "aggravated felony," a broad category of crimes ranging from shoplifting to murder that carry sentences of at least one year of imprisonment, said Sin Yen Ling, a senior staff attorney at the Asian Law Caucus in San Francisco.

"Because of their immigration status, they're penalized," said Ling, an immigration attorney who handles nearly 50 aggravated felony cases a year."

There's no bail, no bond, it's mandatory deportation. Even if you were to get a sympathetic judge, their hands are tied. By law, it takes away the ability to review individual cases."

Federal immigration officials are simply prioritizing their resources on criminal aliens who present the greatest risk to the security of our communities, according to ICE spokeswoman Nicole Navas.

In 2010, ICE announced record-breaking illegal immigration enforcement numbers under the Obama administration, including unprecedented numbers of "convicted criminal alien removals."

Half of the individuals removed from the United States -- more than 195,000 people -- were convicted criminals, a 70% increase, according to ICE.

"Everybody in their right mind would think that criminal aliens should be removed," said Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform.

"No, it's not harsh. Coming as an immigrant is a privilege, and we expect that you stay out of trouble."

Philadelphia immigration attorney Caitlin Barry says the broad definition of "aggravated felony" and the retroactive application of the law have created a constant stream of criminal deportation cases.

Although Dang was released under ICE supervision, a removal order remained in effect. He was allowed to re-enter the community and make a life for himself because at the time, Cambodia was not issuing visas to deportees from the United States, Barry said.

"Unfortunately, as soon as those visas to Cambodia became available, Chally was rounded up with the other guys and sent to Cambodia," Barry said. "Chally's case is the perfect illustration of how severe these laws have gotten."

Because of Dang's deportation, Cruz has found herself a single mother of four, struggling to make ends meet while working as a receptionist at a Philadelphia law firm.

She has sold household items and the family vehicle to pay the bills. She has also applied for welfare and other government assistance to feed her children.

"What I've experienced, I wouldn't want any other family to have to go through," said Cruz, a permanent resident who came to the United States as an infant from the Philippines. "I want that law to be taken and thrown in the garbage because it does nothing, it doesn't make anything better."

The deportations are a disservice to those who have come out of the system and changed their lives, said Kiernan, the One Love Movement co-founder.

"I don't believe that refugees should be subject to deportation, period. That's not their home anymore. They came here, this is their home," Kiernan said.

"Everyday families are being broken apart, and every day, there are children suffering without a parent."

While Cruz tidied up her home after hosting a One Love meeting on a recent Saturday, she paused and looked at her children coloring quietly in their sparse living room.

"They made me a single mother," Cruz said. "It touches everyone involved."

Deportation on hold for cancer patient's guardians (AP via San Jose Mercury News)

2011-08-31T11:14:00.002-04:00

Deportation on hold for cancer patient's guardians

By E.J. TAMARA Associated Press
Posted: 08/30/2011 03:31:24 PM PDT

LOS ANGELES—Immigration authorities on Tuesday agreed to suspend the deportation of the guardians of a 17-year-old California leukemia patient and release them from detention, an official said.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement will suspend for a year the deportation to Peru of Jose Humberto and Hilda Jauregui (HOW'-ray-gee), whose granddaughter Joseline suffers from leukemia and diabetes, said Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for the agency.

Authorities also will suspend the deportation of Lili Jauregui, the couple's daughter, who has been detained with them since July, Kice said.

Kice did not provide a reason for the suspensions except to say they were "appropriate."

The decision comes a day after The Associated Press reported that Joseline, who is a U.S. citizen, had asked immigration authorities to refrain from deporting her grandparents for humanitarian reasons.

While the teen's cancer is in remission, she is still undergoing related treatment and said she needs the Jaureguis—who have raised her since birth and became her formal guardians last year—to care for her.

"If they take them away, I don't think I can live," she told the AP before ICE's decision.

Immigration authorities arrested the Jaureguis at their Duarte home in July. The couple had tried to obtain legal papers more than a decade ago but was defrauded by a lawyer who botched the case, said Jessica Dominguez, the family's current immigration attorney.

Dominguez said she expected the family to be released Tuesday night.

FACT FINDER: How police & prosecutors fight illegal immigrant crime (WSBT-IN)

2011-08-31T09:52:00.004-04:00

FACT FINDER: How police & prosecutors fight illegal immigrant crime
Immigration spokesperson says ICE prioritizes "serious criminals who present the greatest risk"

By Kelli Stopczynski
5:09 p.m. EDT, August 30, 2011

ELKHART COUNTY – Last week's violent crime spree in Elkhart County has now put the spotlight on illegal immigrants and crime. WSBT’s Fact Finder 22 team did some more digging Tuesday on how Elkhart County police and prosecutors handle suspected illegals who break the law.

Francisco Macias is the man accused of stabbing two women. He is a "person of interest" in a house fire that killed three people.

WSBT found out Macias might have still been in the United States legally even though he was apparently not a U.S. citizen. Court documents from a 2008 domestic violence case show Macias was born in Mexico and was not a citizen of the United States. But we might never know if he was here illegally because Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) can't release that information without a signed waiver from Macias.

We did find out the bigger problem of illegal immigrants and crime is frustrating for Elkhart County police and prosecutors.

When Elkhart County Prosecutor Curtis Hill took office in 2003, he required deputy prosecutors to report convicted criminals who were illegal to ICE.

“[That reporting] went on for quite some time and nothing ever seemed to happen. You can't burden your deputies with this is another part of a job because this is really not their job. It's beyond us,” said Ed Windbigler, chief investigator for the Elkhart County Prosecutor’s Office.

The prosecutor’s office is obligated to properly prosecute people who commit crimes and a fair number of those people are not legal citizens, he added.

But if immigration officials don’t pick illegals up, there’s not much else the prosecutor can do.

“It’s a matter of resources,” Windbigler said. “If they only have two offices in the state, I don’t know how they would ever keep up with the number of people who may be here illegally who have committed a crime.”

Before the prosecutor’s office ever sees those cases, many of them begin with officers on the streets and at the Elkhart County Jail. They often have to determine whether a suspect is legal and that process isn’t easy.

“There's a lot of forged documents out there,” said Elkhart County Undersheriff Sean Holmes. “That's getting into a whole other topic, but that does happen.”

Even though everyone booked into the jail is asked if they were born in the United States and their names turned over to ICE if their answer is "no," police still have to be careful not to violate somebody's rights during an investigation.

“You can't just pick somebody up and arrest them because you think they're not a citizen,” Holmes said.

Regardless, it’s a complicated issue with no clear cut answer.

“I don’t have a solution for you, I really don't,” said Windbigler. “It is a problem but it's much bigger than Elkhart, Indiana.”

In a written statement to WSBT, ICE spokeswoman Gail Montenegro said “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is focused on sensible, effective immigration enforcement that prioritizes first on serious criminals who present the greatest risk to the security of our communities.”

The statement went on to say ICE had “record-breaking immigration enforcement statistics” in fiscal year 2010.

“For two years in a row, ICE has removed more aliens than were removed in fiscal year 2008,” wrote Montenegro. “In fiscal year 2010, half of those removed—more than 195,000—were convicted criminals. The fiscal year 2010 statistics represent increases of more than 23,000 removals overall and 81,000 criminal removals compared to fiscal year 2008.”

WSBT has been in e-mail contact with Elkhart Superior Court Judge Evan Roberts who apparently knew Macias was not a legal U.S. resident in a domestic violence case. He sentenced Macias to probation. Judge Roberts told WSBT he still needs time to review the case before commenting on it.

Police: Drunken driver stranded self in Glouco floodwaters before setting off unneeded search (Courier-Post)

2011-08-30T16:19:00.001-04:00

Police: Drunken driver stranded self in Glouco floodwaters before setting off unneeded search
2:56 PM, Aug. 30, 2011
Written by CourierPostOnline.com

Franklin Township police say a man was driving drunk Monday night when he drove past a road closed sign on Delsea Drive in Franklin Township and became stuck in flood waters there.

The Vineland man then told rescuers he was only a passenger in the truck, prompting police to call out a state police helicopter area to search the waters for the alleged driver.

The search was eventually called off when police determined the man was lying.

The driver, Lorenzo Baltazar, was charged with drunken driving and hindering arrest, police said.

Baltazar is being detained by Immigration Customs Enforcement officials at the Gloucester County Jail, police said.

For Bay Area immigrants facing imminent deportation, new Obama policy offers no reprieve (Contra Costa Times)

2011-08-29T23:01:00.003-04:00

*****UPDATE BELOW******

For Bay Area immigrants facing imminent deportation, new Obama policy offers no reprieve
By Matt O'Brien
Contra Costa Times
Posted: 08/29/2011 04:30:41 PM PDT

CONCORD -- Less than two weeks ago, the Obama administration announced it would stop deporting many illegal immigrants who are not public safety threats. But Monday, Arturo Rengifo Jr., a college student and Peruvian citizen who is no one's idea of a threat, paced the floor in his Concord living room as he prepared to be shipped back to Lima on Tuesday.

Rengifo, 24, who has lived in the United States since he was 6, is one of a number of immigrants in the Bay Area and around the country caught in a bureaucratic tangle: While the administration has announced its intent to change immigration policy, it hasn't yet implemented a new system, so planned deportations are proceeding.

"The new policy is to not break families apart, but they're not budging on this," said Rengifo, who must leave the country along with his father, while his mother and brother will stay in the Bay Area. "For us to leave everything here would just be a big, big tragedy."

The college student waited for hopeful news on his cell phone as his father, who suffers from depression, sat nervously on a sofa. His mother's voice shook as she contemplated what would happen to the family if she lost her son and husband of more than 30 years.

"We've never depended on the government, we pay our taxes, we've never had problems with anybody," Emperatriz Rengifo said. "I don't know what I will do without them."

The Department of Homeland Security announced more than a week ago that it will review 300,000 pending cases to prioritize deporting felons, but the agency clarified Monday that it has not begun the case-by-case reviews and will continue to enforce immigration law as it did before the announcement.

"Because the working group is in the midst of designing the process for reviewing cases, no individual cases have been administratively closed or otherwise affected by the policy," the agency said.

Eventually, a committee of federal lawyers and other officials from Homeland Security and the Department of Justice will review each pending case and focus "on the removal of criminal aliens, other aliens who pose a threat to public safety or national security, repeat immigration law violators, recent illegal border crossers, and immigration fugitives."

Rengifo does not fall under any of those high-priority categories. The graduate of Ygnacio Valley High School has a clean record, studies at Diablo Valley College, works in customer relations at an AT&T store and helps his family run a day care service at their home. However, an immigration agent told him last week that he does not qualify for a reprieve because his father's long-standing plea for political asylum had already been litigated, and lost.

Agents plan to escort the 69-year-old father and his son to San Francisco International Airport on Tuesday night, where the two men -- both named Arturo Rengifo -- will board a flight to Lima, splitting the family of four as Emperatriz Rengifo and the couple's older son remain in Concord.

"My family is all I have," Arturo Rengifo Jr. said. "Without them, it's like we're falling apart. Imagining my mom by herself is really depressing."

His mother's deportation is on hold because judges found her asylum testimony more credible than her husband's. Meanwhile, his older brother has a path to legal residency because he married a U.S. citizen.

The imminent deportation of half the Rengifo family reflects ongoing confusion over the new Obama administration policy, which was made public Aug. 18 and celebrated by many immigration advocates because of the promise to drop thousands of low-priority cases. The administration also released new guidelines in June that instruct agents to reconsider deporting some immigrants, including high school graduates such as Rengifo who have lived in the U.S. since childhood, but immigration lawyers say those guidelines are not always followed.

"According to (immigration agents), the Dream Act was denied and the kid is good to go," said Rhoda Wilkinson Domingo, the Rengifo family's lawyer. "He's had his bite of the apple is what they keep telling me."

The Rengifos were not the only Bay Area family who cited the new Obama administration policy in pleading for a last-minute reprieve this week. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Monday detained Victor Rosales, of East Palo Alto, and planned to deport him to Guatemala. U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-San Francisco, and Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, asked federal officials to put his deportation on hold. The Board of Immigration Appeals denied the appeal on Monday afternoon but then, late in the day, the immigration agency granted him a 30-day stay.

After fingerprinting him and getting ready to place him in detention, Rosales said immigration agents appeared annoyed at getting the late-afternoon call to release him, but his wife and 2-year-old son were overjoyed when he came out of custody.

"I feel at peace, so relieved," said his wife, Idania Rosales-Picen.

The Guatemalan man's wife had applied for political asylum because she had been abused by a former husband in Guatemala, but the family -- like the Rengifos -- recently lost their case at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The family's lawyer said that Rosales and his wife have a 1996 shoplifting conviction, making it less likely that their case would be reconsidered.

San Francisco attorney Mark Silverman of the Immigrant Legal Resource Center said these cases might not be a good gauge of the new policy, since judges already had issued a final order of deportation for both Rosales and the Rengifos.

"It's vague," Silverman said of the new policy. "It's hard to say how it is going to be implemented."

He hoped that of the 300,000 cases being reviewed, at least a third of them would be administratively closed, but he said it might depend on the discretion of immigration agents, some of whom are likely to personally oppose the new mandate.

Immigration control groups think the case-by-case review violates the will of Congress.

"This goes way beyond just some regulatory changes," said Ira Mehlman of the Federation for American Immigration Reform. "Essentially, the administration has scrapped the existing immigration policies and made its own."

Mehlman said immigration agents should be able to use discretion in "extenuating, unusual circumstances," but he argued that the new policy gives a blanket reprieve to entire categories of people who violated immigration laws.

********UPDATE*********

Handful of Deportations Halted as New Removal Criteria Worked Out
August 31, 2011, 3:06 pm • Posted by Jon Brooks

Arturo Rengifo and his son, Arturo Rengifo, Jr., are two undocumented Concord residents who were ordered to leave the country by Aug 30. Yesterday, however, Immigration and Customs Enforcement granted them a 30-day reprieve so it could review their case. But it took an intervention by a U.S. Senator -- Dick Durbin from Illinois -- to stall the process.

According to the Rengifos' lawyer, Rhoda Wilkinson Domingo, Mr. Rengifo’s wife is not subject to an order of removal, and another son is a permanent resident. Wilkinson Domingo also sent out the following background information yesterday:

Mr. Rengifo and his family fled from Peru in 1993 after they were attacked and threatened by the Shining Path, a terrorist guerilla movement that now engages in highly dangerous narcotics trafficking. The Rengifo children were 15 and 6 years old, respectively, at the time. They have not left the United States since then.

"My father and I never even packed," Rengifo, Jr. told KQED's Mina Kim yesterday. "It's been the greatest miracle ever, that's ever happened to me. Even these 30 days gives us another chance of hope to live and just do what we need to do here, and that's live the American dream, and live as a family."

"We've never been split apart, ever. For me and my dad to leave and to leave my mom here, it's taking part of my mom's heart. It's really devastating. I'm still in this state of mind where I am going to stay here. I'm putting everything in the hands of God, whatever's going to happen is going to happen. But I know that good things will happen to us, hopefully, since we are good people."

Here's audio [link] of Rengifo's reaction, which starts with his recounting of his appeal to ICE to reassess his case under the new federal guidelines that prioritize deportation of undocumented immigrants who pose a public safety risk, as opposed to those who meet certain mitigating criteria -- outlined in a Jun 17 memo (pdf). Rengifo says an immigration officer told him the policy shift was "not new news," and that deportations were continuing.

In that Jun 17 memo, under a header called "Factors to Consider When Exercising Prosecutorial Discretion," ICE officials are directed to weigh some 20 considerations in deciding whether to apprehend, detain, or remove any of the 300,000 immigrants who currently face deportation. Such factors include education, age, health status, ties and contributions to the community, and family ties to legal residents.

However, as reported in this Contra Costa Times article about the Rengifos, the case-by-case reviews under the new policy have not yet begun, as the process for assessment is still being worked out. However:

Bay Area immigration lawyers have heard of a few anecdotal cases of immigration agents or judges halting a deportation since the June memo, and all of those involved illegal immigrants who are students or same-sex married spouses.

Last week, a San Francisco judge closed a deportation case against a member of a same-sex couple from southern California. The judge’s decision came at the request of ICE. Two other same-sex couples, including one from Oakland, have also had their deportation orders rescinded. All the cases involve men who married legal residents in states allowing same-sex marriage. Previously, this was not enough to shield an undocumented spouse from deportation, as it would in an opposite-sex marriage, because the Defense of Marriage Act prohibits federal recognition of same-sex unions.

Despite policy, Friendswood teacher deported (Houston Chronicle)

2011-08-29T17:36:00.002-04:00

Despite policy, Friendswood teacher deported
By SUSAN CARROLL, HOUSTON CHRONICLE
Updated 12:45 a.m., Saturday, August 27, 2011

Sha' Vonne Ironche's husband called her Tuesday afternoon from inside the Houston immigration detention center, saying an officer told him to have a bag packed and ready by 5 p.m. for his deportation flight back to Spain.

She blacked out. The other teachers at her Houston-area school had to call her mother to come and pick her up.

Just days earlier, she and her husband, Esterny Ironche, a 55-year-old Spanish teacher, had high hopes he would be spared from deportation. Obama administration officials last week announced a case-by-case review of pending immigration cases, saying they planned to dismiss "low-priority" cases involving non-criminals to better target dangerous criminals.

Esterny Ironche had no criminal history, and he was married to a U.S. citizen. He had overstayed a visa 15 years ago, but had paid his taxes and had legal work authorization from the government. He had a case pending before the Board of Immigration Appeals. And he was in remission for prostate cancer and participating in a clinical trial in Houston.

All of those factors, the lives that had carefully constructed together here, would surely count in his favor, they figured.

But the government did not spare Ironche, who was loaded onto a flight from Houston to Dallas with the suitcase his wife had packed for him. He arrived in Madrid early Thursday.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said Friday that they could not comment on Ironche's deportation, citing the agency's privacy policy. A DHS official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the agency has not yet started the national case reviews. The agency is still operating as it did before the Aug. 18 announcement, the official said, and will continue to do so until the government establishes a formal case review process.

Wife is a citizen

"It's a tragedy," said Raed Gonzalez, a Houston immigration attorney. "There are many promises from the administration, but nothing is really coming about."

"It's really sad that they're still separating families," he said.

Sha' Vonne Ironche spent the day on Friday filling out paperwork officially resigning her husband's position with the school district and trying to figure out what to do with the new home they recently bought together in Friendswood.

She was trying to be strong for her 5-year-old daughter, Ironche's stepdaughter, who kept asking for "Papa."

She has a contract with her school district, and no immediate plans to pack up and move to Madrid. But, the 32-year-old said, she feels lost without Ironche, and will eventually find her way there to be with him, if that's what it takes.

"I feel out of place, and I belong here," she said. "I don't feel this is my home and my country. I cannot believe this."

Ironche had entered the U.S. legally and overstayed his visa, applying for a green card in 1995 based on an earlier marriage. Sha' Vonne Ironche said her husband's application languished for years and was denied after his divorce. But he was not notified, she said, and the government continued to renew his work authorization year after year.

They taught at the same school and fell in love three years ago. He was a doting father to her daughter, Carmen, from an earlier marriage, she said.

The couple planned to have a big wedding in October 2009, she said, but Ironche was diagnosed with prostate cancer in late August of that year. They decided to move the wedding up and exchanged vows in a quiet ceremony in the minister's backyard in September 2009, three days before he had surgery to remove his prostate.

Still in shock

But when the couple applied in 2010 for a green card based on his recent marriage, immigration officials grilled them about the hasty wedding, she said. They said Ironche had an immigration warrant dating to 2007. His green card application was denied. On Aug. 5, immigration officials detained him. His lawyer requested that the government consider exercising prosecutorial discretion and dismissing his case, but they declined.

Sha'Vonne Ironche said she can't understand why the government went ahead with the deportation, especially after the announcement that gave them hope.

"When the president says we don't need to deport people who don't have criminal records, you should acknowledge it," she said.

Sha'Vonne Ironche said she's still in shock, but is starting to think about the future, trying to figure out how to get her family back together. That most likely will someday result in her leaving her home here in Texas and moving to Madrid.

"I have no choice," she said. "That's where my husband is."

Undocumented immigrant tries to navigate an uncertain future (Salt Lake City Tribune)

2011-08-29T17:14:00.006-04:00

Undocumented immigrant tries to navigate an uncertain future

BY DAVID MONTERO
The Salt Lake Tribune

First published Aug 27 2011 11:13PM

West Valley City • David Morales is a teenager. A bundle of contradictions wrapped within his wiry frame.

He cares deeply about people and dreams of helping the homeless. But then he’ll blow off a meeting with a guidance counselor at school. “They’ll reschedule,” he says.

He is passionate about his Christian faith, reading the Bible daily, professing his love for God on Facebook and sometimes speaking in tongues at church. But he’ll just as easily judge an entire group of Bible school teachers as corrupt — without any knowledge of malfeasance.

He loves his family members and yet, by speaking publicly, puts them at risk. But the biggest contradiction of all is the one he is powerless to control: Morales is an undocumented immigrant. The place he calls home, in the eyes of the government, isn’t that at all.

“I want to be able to build a church here and to pastor to people here,” he said. “I want to raise kids and give them the opportunities I’d have. I would like that to be in America.”

He has an Oct. 6 court date. For months his family planned to go back to Mexico.

Then Aug. 18 happened and may have changed everything.

Policy shift » When Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano issued a letter that day outlining the Obama administration’s policy of prosecutorial discretion, optimism erupted in the Morales family.

“My mom and dad were really happy,” Morales said. “My mom called the attorney to ask what it meant for me, and I heard that I might be able to get a temporary work permit. But I won’t believe anything until I have a permit in my hand.”

The new policy is estimated to affect about 300,000 cases in the midst of removal proceedings and is believed to affect people like Morales who have been in the country for more than five years, have no criminal record and are enrolled in college.

The 19-year-old Morales appears to fit the bill on all counts.

But Matthew Kolken, a high-profile immigration attorney based in New York, made a prediction last week on Twitter that he believes only about 1,000 of the estimated 300,000 would actually be beneficiaries of the new policy.

“I think the Obama administration is doing this as a publicity stunt,” Kolken told The Salt Lake Tribune. “I think there will be about 1,000 cases that will be newsworthy enough that the administration will try to avoid embarrassment and that those are the ones who will benefit. If you’re anonymous, forget it.”

He said Morales has improved his chances “exponentially” because his arrest earlier this year was so public.

However, Gillian Christensen, spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said the policy outlined by the Obama administration would be followed as outlined.

“ICE is focused on smart, effective immigration enforcement that prioritizes the removal of criminal aliens, recent border crossers and egregious immigration law violators, such as those who have been previously removed from the U.S.,” she said in a statement. “The agency exercises prosecutorial discretion, on a case-by-case basis, as necessary to focus resources on these priorities.”

Morales hopes he’s a low priority, which is why he has felt emboldened enough to speak publicly on his case despite an alleged threat made by an ICE agent who told him if he talked to the media, he would be put back in jail.

Lori Haley, ICE spokeswoman, said there is a complaint process through the Office of the Inspector General and DHS open to those who believe they’ve been victims of civil rights violations or misconduct.

Morales said he didn’t know about that. He said he forgives that agent and prefers to remember the ICE agent in Louisiana who let him bring his Bible into the jail cell after his arrest.

“I’m actually thankful for that,” he said.

Border crossing » He came to the United States when he was 9, crossing the border at Nogales with his mother and his younger brother with the help of coyotes and a border agent taking bribes before making a long drive up to Salt Lake City, where his father, who had arrived almost a year earlier, was already waiting for him. Morales said he remembered his first day in Utah and how he walked into a large grocery store with his dad.

“There were some Hot Wheels that were, like, 99 cents. I said, ‘That’s too expensive.’ I was, like, ‘We could buy a whole pack of tortillas with that,’ ” Morales recalled. “I remember he said, ‘This is your life now.’ ”

Morales paused, thinking about that small purple car.

“I started crying.”

That was in August 2001. During the next 10 years, he would go to Monroe Elementary and Hunter High, getting a mix of good and bad grades and meeting a mix of good and bad friends. He graduated from the alternative high school, Granite Peaks.

His parents would land jobs in the service industry, and they were able to buy a house five years ago. With the family’s strong Pentecostal roots, Morales knew he wanted to be a preacher. When he saw the chance to go to a Bible college in Louisiana, the family gave its blessing.

On Jan. 4, while sleeping on the bus rumbling its way to Lafayette, Morales had a dream.

Thirty minutes later, when he woke up, it came true as a nightmare.

Visions » Morales said he’s always been prone to visions and revelations.

When he was a child in Acapulco, he was so sick with a rare disease, doctors believed he wouldn’t walk again. During that time in the hospital, he said he had visions of angels and demons in the room. He said he prayed to God to just let him walk again and that he’d go wherever God told him to go on his legs. He said God answered that prayer.

Later, as a 17-year-old, he was complaining about having to walk home from school then, suddenly, heard the voice of God filled with sadness — recalling the promise made and the blessing received.

“I felt terrible,” Morales said. “I stopped complaining right there.”

So, when he dreamed on the bus in Texas that federal agents pulled it over, boarded it and asked for his identification that he didn’t have — and it all played out exactly as he had dreamed — it wasn’t a surprise to him.

“God said this is part of the process. He’s like, ‘Relax, I got this,’ ” Morales said. “I was shaking, but I wasn’t looking to run away. I knew it was going to be a hard process. But I don’t think God gives more than I can handle.”

He spent 17 days in jail and was released on a $4,000 bond. He came back to Utah and remembered the promise he made to God — that he would go wherever he wanted him to go. And if that meant Mexico, then he would do it.

But in the meantime, he met a group trying to pressure Congress into passing the DREAM Act. He decided then to be an activist.

A dream » The Salt Lake Dream Team meets once a week, usually on the Jordan campus of Salt Lake Community College.

It’s a mix of youths — citizens and undocumented immigrants — that strictly follows Roberts Rules of Order to run the meeting.

Raymi Gutierrez, 22, said Morales joined the group in the early days of summer.

“He’s different,” she said. “He wants to make a difference, but he needs to remember he’s not Superman. He can’t do everything.”

Morales, who still feared retaliation for talking to the media, was eager to discuss his situation. But often, at public events where The Salt Lake Dream Team would appear, he would stealthily materialize in the background. He would push the envelope as far as he could without violating the instructions laid down by the ICE officer who threatened him.

At an open house hosted by Sen. Orrin Hatch in July, The Dream Team arrived dressed in graduation gowns and sang “Happy Birthday” to the DREAM Act, which was written by Hatch 10 years ago. It would offer a pathway to citizenship for children brought to the United States by undocumented immigrants, provided the child — among other things — attended college or served in the military.

Morales blended in with the crowd, careful to avoid the camera, but smiling mischievously while wearing sunglasses.

He would slink around news conferences, flirting with the possibility that he might be stopped and asked to be interviewed or end up on television.

Then, he decided to work with members of The Salt Lake Dream Team on a project. They were approached by television producers to be the subject of a reality TV show that would follow the lives of undocumented immigrants. He agreed to do it.

Diego Ibañez, one of the Dream Team organizers, said Morales is “a good kid who can seem a bit naive about some things.” But he said he has never met someone as optimistic.

“He always thinks things are going to work out,” Ibañez said. “To someone else, it looks different and can be hard to understand. But that’s just David.”

—
Emergency room » While at his Dream Team meeting Wednesday night, Morales didn’t feel well. He slipped out without saying anything to anyone and passed out. He woke with bad stomach cramps and coughing up some blood.

He walked across the street to the Jordan Valley Medical Center’s emergency room.

“I thought I was going to die,” he said.

Morales didn’t pay a dime for the care.

Molly Evans, emergency room manager, said it’s the hospital’s policy to not turn away anyone who needs medical care. Income and legal status, she said, aren’t considerations when faced with a sick patient.

Rep. Chris Herrod, R-Provo, proposed a bill in the past legislative session that sought to tackle the issue of free medical care for undocumented immigrants. It failed because it had a $35 million fiscal note, but he plans to take on the issue again in the upcoming session.

“I’m not advocating we deny care, but what frustrates me is these costs aren’t ever calculated into the illegal immigration debate,” Herrod said. “Again, I’m not advocating we deny care, but those costs are there.”

Laura Ruiz, a 21-year-old friend from Heber City, accompanied Morales back to his house after his stay in the hospital, and she went with him to school, where he battled stomach pains off and on throughout the morning.

Sitting in his developmental reading class at Salt Lake Community College on Thursday wearing a gray shirt with the word “Revolutionary” written on it in bold letters, Morales watched the teacher, Kathleen Johnston, write the word “Respect” on a whiteboard and ask the class what it meant.

After several offered answers which Johnston wrote down, Morales raised his hand — the hospital wristband from his ER visit sliding down his thin wrist.

“Treat other people as you want to be treated,” he said.

Johnston nodded her head and put it on the board.

After class, Morales went back to the house to work on what he would say at a news conference he is planning for Wednesday. He thought about his past and his future. Where he had been and where he was going.

And, looking at the toy purple car he has kept to this day, how his father told him things would be different.

He told the doctors his story. They treated his ulcer, and he was dismissed a few hours later.

Special visas fast-track illegal immigrants to residency (Philadelphia Inquirer via Bellingham Herald)

2011-08-29T11:57:00.003-04:00

Special visas fast-track illegal immigrants to residency
By MICHAEL MATZA | The Philadelphia Inquirer

POSTED: Sunday, Aug. 28, 2011

PHILADELPHIA The federal government has an unusual fast track to legal residency for illegal immigrants.

Antonio Luna's ticket was a bullet in the back.

The 30-year-old Mexican, who slipped into the United States in 2000, was delivering pizza to a narrow South Philadelphia street on a night two summers ago.

The customer on the steps, in a hat raked low, took his time paying - time enough for another man to leap from between parked cars and thrust a gun against Luna's forehead.

Luna gave up the food, his cellphone, and $140. The first man ransacked his car; the gunman forced him to the ground. "He told me, 'If you want to run, run,' " Luna recounted recently. "I didn't have a chance because he shot me" in the lower back.

Gushing blood, howling in pain, thinking he might die, Luna never imagined how the assault would better not only his life, but also that of his wife and two children.

The next morning, detectives came to his bed at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. They told him they did not care about his immigration status. They just wanted his help. He immediately picked the gunman from a book of mug shots. Police made the arrest that night.

For aiding the investigation, Luna got a reward: a "U visa."

It grants residency to illegal immigrants who have been victims of violence and cooperate with law enforcement. That could range from giving information to police to testifying at trial.

A U visa includes a work permit good for four years. After three years, the victim can apply for a green card, allowing permanent work-authorization and residency.

In the nearly three years that U visas have been available, about 25,000 victims and 19,000 relatives have received them. The number living in the Philadelphia area was not immediately available from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Lawyers who represent illegal immigrants say their risk of abuse, exploitation and victimization is high because they fear deportation if they report a crime.

For years, Luna had tried to live small, to avoid notice.

After he was shot, his application for a U visa was guided by Brenda Gorski, a lawyer at Philadelphia's pro-immigrant Nationalities Services Center. Instead of dying, he said, he was "reborn." Because U visas are "derivative" - they include immediate family members - his wife, Beatriz, 27, mother of their two U.S.-born children, became a legal resident, too.
Congress created not only U visas, but also T visas, for victims of human trafficking.

The government defines that crime as enslavement, in which the trafficker uses fraud or coercion to recruit people for forced labor and, often, sexual exploitation.

Immigration experts differentiate between human trafficking and human smuggling. A smuggled person consents to being spirited over the border and goes free in America. But trafficked victims are bound to their traffickers, who ensure their dependency by taking their money and identification. They are forced to work at menial jobs, typically nail salons and massage parlors, and are under constant surveillance. If they try to escape, they are beaten or blackmailed.

"If victims come forward, there is the possibility of relief. We don't want them to stand in the shadows anymore," said Tony Bryson, director of U.S. Customs and Immigration Services (USCIS) in Philadelphia, which recently held a daylong training about U and T visas for police and advocacy groups.

Up to 10,000 U visas may be issued annually, with no limit for immediate family members. The annual cap on T visas is 5,000, but fewer than 450 have ever been approved in a single year, because so few trafficking victims are willing to apply.

They fear reprisals not only against themselves; trafficking networks routinely make threats against family members still in the homeland.

As a result, the T-visa program is "woefully undersubscribed," said Rose Hartmann, a federal immigration officer who attended the recent Philadelphia training.

Groups urging restrictions on illegal immigration, including the Federation for American Immigration Reform and the Center for Immigration Studies, contend that U and T visas make the immigration system too generous by handing out work permits at a time when the country lacks jobs for its citizens. And the lure of a green card, they say, can entice some immigrants to report bogus crimes.

Immigrant advocates say the number of green cards granted under the U and T programs is a mere fraction of the million cards issued annually. Immigrants who file false reports or commit perjury, they note, are subject to prosecution and deportation.

All applications are channeled to the USCIS service center in Burlington, Vt., where 73 adjudications officers and supervisors authenticate them. Supporting paperwork usually includes medical and police reports, as well as the law enforcement letter certifying cooperation.

A federal trial set for next month in Philadelphia holds the possibility of T visas for victims of trafficking.

The case involves five brothers from Ukraine, ages 35 to 51, known to prosecutors as "the Botsvynyuk boys." Last summer, they were charged with forcing about 30 illegal immigrants to work as virtual slaves from 2000 to 2007 cleaning department stores and supermarkets in the Philadelphia area.

According to the indictment, the brothers promised the immigrants they would earn $500 a month, with free room and board. Instead, they slept five to a room on dirty mattresses, worked for little or nothing, were told they had to pay off transportation costs of $10,000 to $50,000. They were beaten, and a female victim repeatedly raped.

Violence was threatened against family still living in Ukraine, the indictment said. For instance, one brother said he would place a worker's 9-year-old daughter into prostitution to pay off the family debt.

Patty Hartman, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Philadelphia, said the immigrant workers have remained in Philadelphia and might be called to testify at trial. Their cooperation could make them eligible for T visas.

As part of a T-visa awareness campaign launched last month, the federal government produced two provocative one-minute public service videos about sexual slavery and forced labor.

The videos, airing nationally in Spanish and English markets, encourage viewers to report suspicious activity in the hope, said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Deputy Director Kumar Kibble, of reaching "victims who have endured so much pain."

A test case on deportation shift (Omaha World-Herald)

2011-08-29T11:52:00.003-04:00

A test case on deportation shift

Published Sunday August 28, 2011
By Cindy Gonzalez
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

Luis Cervantes was pushing a shopping cart and collecting recyclables from curbside trash cans when two Omaha beat patrol officers stopped him.

The 30-year-old "kept ignoring" them, the officers said in a report. Though he eventually gave his name to a Spanish-speaking officer, Cervantes offered conflicting birth dates and had no ID on him. He was taken to jail, where he spent two days and was booked on suspicion of stealing a grocery cart.

Only later would officials realize that Cervantes — who has been diagnosed as autistic and moderately mentally retarded — can't communicate much. He pleaded guilty, was fined $25, and the misdemeanor case was closed.

But by that time, the U.S. Homeland Security Department had been contacted, and the Mexico-born Cervantes last October joined the crowded court docket of illegal immigrants the government wants to deport.

Today Cervantes is poised to be a test case under a new and controversial Obama administration directive to suspend deportation proceedings against illegal immigrants determined to pose no threat to public safety.

The policy shift could include work permits for select cases.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Aug. 18 that a working group formed this month would be looking, one by one, at nearly 300,000 pending deportation cases across the nation with an eye toward sidelining low-priority cases.

Napolitano said the president has said repeatedly that "it makes no sense to expend our enforcement resources on low-priority cases" such as students brought to this country as kids by their parents.

She referred to a June 17 memo by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director John Morton that urged federal ICE officials to tap already existing "prosecutorial discretion." He listed factors to be weighed positively, including significant time spent in the United States, whether the illegal immigrant has been a victim of domestic violence or has an immediate relative who has served in the U.S. military. Negative factors would include being a gang member or a "serious felon," having an immigration fraud conviction or having repeatedly violated immigration laws.

The case reviews are intended to ease a court backlog. But how many of the 300,000 ultimately will be considered low-priority cases is unknown, and the number could depend on how prosecutors weigh an immigrant's use of false identification to work.

Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, already has called for congressional hearings to stop implementation. He is among critics who contend it amounts to "back-door amnesty," bypassing Congress and giving a pass to people who have broken immigration laws.

"We have a president who thinks he can run the country by executive order," King said.

Meanwhile, immigrant advocates are holding meetings to try to answer myriad questions and warn against con artists with big fees. Lawyers are waiting for clarity on how work permits would be granted. And many are wondering how long it might take to review the 300,000 deportation cases.

In the Omaha Immigration Court alone, which covers Nebraska and Iowa, deportation cases are so backed up that local attorneys say some clients are getting trial dates five years from now. The average wait in the Omaha court is 525 days — higher than the national average of 482 and the fourth-highest of all the nation's 30 immigration courts, according to TRAC's Immigration Project. Its sponsors include the Ford Foundation and Syracuse University.

As of Aug. 1, the Omaha Immigration Court had 4,827 pending proceedings, according to the national body that oversees the courts. TRAC said the two states were on pace to set local deportation records this year.

The uncertainty of just how or when Obama's directive will trickle down became evident when Cervantes appeared last week in the Omaha Immigration Court.

He has a mental disability — a positive factor that "should prompt particular care and consideration," according to the Morton memo, which also points out that prosecutorial discretion may be exercised at any step of a removal proceeding.

But Cervantes — who earlier had been released from federal custody on his own recognizance — was ordered to appear in May 2012 for further deportation court proceedings.

His attorney, Kristin Fearnow, plans to formally request to close Cervantes' case, based on medical evaluations that federal officials haven't yet analyzed and on support letters.

The Cervantes family is five in all. Another son, Rolando, 29, shares Luis' autistic condition.

Dad Francisco left their homeland of Sinaloa, Mexico, in the mid-1990s in search of better pay. His wife and their youngest son followed in 1998. Their other teenage boys came six months later. All entered the U.S. illegally.

None of the Cervantes brothers attended school in the United States, his parents said.

Though Luis Cervantes was a candidate for prosecutorial discretion even before the presidential directive, Fearnow said his case now is stronger. "He is no danger. He fits the criteria."

An interagency working group from Homeland Security and the U.S. Justice Department already has started meeting to review cases. The group also is to issue guidance to prevent other low-priority cases from entering the system.

Some see the directive as a move by Obama to curry favor with Latino voters, but Susan Smith of the anti-illegal immigration Nebraskans Advisory Group believes it will create a voter backlash.

"Just look at the economy. How can they tell people this with a straight face?" she said.

State Sen. Charlie Janssen of Fremont, a frequent critic of illegal immigration, predicts the move will prompt more action by state and local governments.

"In fact, laws like those passed in Arizona and sponsored by me in Nebraska will become even more necessary as the federal government continually refuses to act," he said.

Amy Peck, an attorney who sits on national immigration law boards, said the directive so far sounds positive for clients but lacks specifics, including who might be eligible for work permits during the time their cases are put on hold.

Sergio Sosa, executive director of the Heartland Workers Center, suspects the president was reacting to mounting dissatisfaction with the administration's Secure Communities enforcement program, which has come under fire for snaring low-risk illegal immigrants and propelling deportations to record numbers. Sosa said his hope is that ICE now will focus on hardened criminals rather than working immigrants.

The line in some cases might be a fine one under guidelines set out by the Morton memo.

Take Feliciano Montejo, a Guatemalan who entered the U.S. illegally more than a decade ago.

His case is among those to be reviewed. The length of time he has been in this country and the fact he has two U.S.-born children are supposed to play in his favor when it comes to being eligible for a suspension of deportation.

Montejo, however, faces charges of using fraudulent identification to work. And the Morton memo specifies that fraud conviction is a negative factor.

Montejo's attorney, Dazmi Castrejon, said her client purchased false ID for his two restaurant jobs but didn't know whether the information belonged to a U.S. citizen.

It's a purchase many illegal immigrants have made to get a paycheck.

"They came to have a better life," Castrejon said. "The way they get that is by working. It's a pretty common scenario."

Had it not been for his immigration status, she said, the documents would not have been bought and the charge would be a nonissue.

While the Morton memo says that no one factor is determinative in prosecutorial discretion, such ambiguity has many immigrants questioning which cases will be suspended.

That's one reason why immigrant advocates continue to press for overhauling immigration laws and providing a path to U.S. citizenship. "All of this does not get rid of the need for federal reform through Congress," said Darcy Tromanhauser of the Nebraska Appleseed Center for Law in the Public Interest.

Since Montejo's arrest in mid-July, his wife, Rosa, has had to find a baby sitter for her daughter, 3, and son, 1, and go to work as a hotel maid, turning to social agencies for help with food and rent. "It's been very hard," said Rosa, 23. "My husband is a good, hardworking man."

The recent policy shift eventually could affect many more of the estimated 11 million immigrants living illegally in the United States.

"One of the objectives here is to keep low-priority enforcement folks out of the caseload in the first place," a senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said in a briefing with reporters.

That provides some comfort to Luis Cervantes' parents, who would like to remain in Nebraska. The couple purchased a modest South Omaha house years ago when it was easier to land jobs without proper authorization.

Since they lost their production line jobs the family has turned to collecting recyclable materials. They earn about $150 a week and get clothing and food at pantries, where they also volunteer.

It was during his weekly stroll to gather cans and plastics that Luis Cervantes roamed from his father and was arrested near 13th and Vinton Streets.

When he didn't return home, his parents called 911 and were told that a man matching Luis' description was in custody. Maria Cervantes sought help at a local charity, and Fearnow agreed to provide her services for free.

Since the handcuffing, Luis won't go to the grocery store or collect cans, Maria said.

Though Luis smiled and said "si" during a recent interview, he mostly fidgeted as his parents spoke.

A medical report to be submitted in immigration court says Luis gets anxious and agitated if he changes routine or does not know his mom's whereabouts. He doesn't use telephones. Mom must prompt him to do the smallest of tasks, including tooth-brushing and shampooing.

Maria said she is afraid her son won't be able to adjust if sent back to Mexico.

"He can't read, write or tell time, but he knows he has an immigration court date," she said. "He keeps saying, 'I have court. I have court.' "

IMMIGRATION: First Inland detention center opening (The Press-Enterprise)

2011-08-29T11:49:00.001-04:00

IMMIGRATION: First Inland detention center opening

10:00 PM PDT on Sunday, August 28, 2011

BY DAVID OLSON
STAFF WRITER

The Inland area's first immigrant-detention center is opening today as part of a government effort to house detainees closer to their homes.

About 25 detainees are expected to move into the Adelanto Immigration and Customs Enforcement Processing Center, with the number gradually rising toward the building's 650-bed capacity. After the construction of an addition, the center could house up to 1,300 people detained on immigration-law violations.

Some immigrant-rights activists worry about alleged problems at other detention facilities run by the Florida-based for-profit company, The GEO Group, that will operate the center.

Company spokesman Pablo Paez declined to comment beyond a written statement, which forecast $42 million in annual revenues for GEO from the center.

The city of Adelanto built the existing facility about two decades ago to house low-level state prisoners, said Adelanto City Manager D. James Hart. The city feared losing income when signs emerged that the state was planning early release of many nonviolent prisoners, he said. Its solution was to contract with ICE, which was seeking more Southern California space. Adelanto then contracted with GEO.

GEO already runs a medium-security state prison east of the building, and it owns land to the west, Hart said. GEO last year bought the city's building for $28 million, which GEO spent $22 million to renovate and retrofit, according to the company.

The government will pay $99 per day for each prisoner.

GEO is planning to open the 650-bed addition on its adjacent land by August 2012, according to the company statement.

The city laid off about 100 people when the state prison closed last year. GEO is giving priority to those 100 people in hiring for the detention center, which will employ about 170 when the addition is completed, Hart said.

Timothy Robbins, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations field director, said the Adelanto center will cut down on transfers of detainees -- especially those with medical problems -- outside Southern California. In the past, some Southern California detainees were sent to Texas , Arizona and other states. The Adelanto facility will provide medical care.

"It allows detainees to be closer to their families, support systems and attorneys," Robbins said.

Housing detainees closer to home also saves the government money in transportation and other costs, he said. The large majority of detainees will be from Southern California.

ICE last year increased the number of Southern California beds by 838 through contracts with Orange County. The other 10 California ICE facilities include Santa Ana, Lancaster, El Centro and a privately run center in San Diego.

Suzanne Foster, executive director of the Pomona Economic Opportunity Center, which serves immigrant workers in the Inland area, said she is worried by reports of mistreatment of detainees in other GEO facilities.

A lawsuit against the company alleges "barbaric" conditions at a Mississippi youth detention center. The U.S. Department of Justice is conducting a civil-rights investigation of the facility. .

Robbins said about 30 of the employees at the center will be ICE employees, and ICE will regularly inspect the facility.

Fernando Romero, coordinator of the Justice for Immigrants Coalition of Inland Southern California, which includes more than 20 religious and other nonprofit groups, said a candlelight vigil outside the center and a forum in Adelanto are being planned.

"We want them to know we're here, and we're watching them," Romero said.

Obama's uncle arrested for DUI, held by ICE as illegal immigrant (MyFoxBoston.com)

2011-08-29T11:37:00.002-04:00

Obama's uncle arrested for DUI, held by ICE as illegal immigrant

Published : Monday, 29 Aug 2011, 10:09 AM EDT

(FOX 25 / MyFoxBoston.com) - President Barack Obama’s long-lost uncle was arrested for drunk driving in Framingham in August, and is now being held by Immigration and Customs Enforcement as an illegal immigrant, the Australian Times is reporting.

According to the paper, Onyango Obama, 67, was arrested outside the Chicken Bone Saloon in Framingham at around 7 p.m. on Aug. 24. Police say he nearly crashed his Mitsubishi 4x4 into a police cruiser before failng a breathalyzer test.

Obama was charged with driving under the influence and driving to endanger, as well as failing to use a turn signal. He was detained as an illegal immigrant because of an outstanding warrant with ICE. He was previously ordered deported to Kenya.

Prosecutor says mom aware when baby pushed to fall (AP via Times Union)

2011-08-26T10:59:00.002-04:00

Prosecutor says mom aware when baby pushed to fall
AMY TAXIN, Associated Press, GILLIAN FLACCUS, Associated Press
Updated 09:50 a.m., Friday, August 26, 2011

SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — A woman described by her husband as blinded by postpartum depression knew what she was doing when she drove their 7-month-old son to the fourth story of a parking garage and pushed him over the edge, prosecutors said Thursday.

Sonia Hermosillo's arraignment was delayed until Monday due to medical issues. The 31-year-old faces one count of murder and one count of assault on a child with force likely to produce great bodily injury resulting in death.

Prosecutors say the mother of three took her infant son to the garage at Children's Hospital of Orange County on Monday, removed a special helmet he wore for a medical condition and pushed him over the edge — then re-entered the building to validate her parking ticket before driving away.

"There are some facts to suggest she knew exactly what she was doing," said Scott Simmons, senior deputy district attorney.

Hermosillo was being held on $1 million bail. A call to her attorney, Chuck Hasse, not was immediately returned.

Hermosillo's husband Noe Medina had said his wife suffered from postpartum depression and did not know what she was doing. He said the couple had no problems during their 13-year-relationship until the birth of their son, who suffered from a condition that required him to wear a special helmet to reshape his head.

"There is no grudge against my wife. Don't judge her poorly.... She is truly ill," Medina said tearfully in his native Spanish on Wednesday, hours after his son died. "Understand the pain that I am in ... I lost my son and now I don't want to lose my wife. I have to keep going on for my two little girls."

Postpartum depression affects up to 20 percent of new mothers and can be triggered or worsened by stresses such as a traumatic childbirth experience, disabilities in the infant or an unsupportive home situation, experts said.

Most of these women have the "baby blues," a bout of depression that goes away within a few weeks, but a tiny fraction — about .01 percent — develop postpartum psychosis, said Stephanie Morales, a licensed marriage and family therapist who specializes in perinatal mood disorders.

Simmons said he expects Hermosillo's case will go to a jury trial. He said the mental state of the accused always plays a role in a homicide trial, but he has not prosecuted a case involving postpartum depression.

If convicted, Hermosillo could face a maximum sentence of 25 years to life, prosecutors said.

By all accounts, Hermosillo was a wonderful mother until the birth of Noe Medina Jr. this year.

The native of Mexico had two older daughters, ages 7 and 10, and she doted on them as a stay-at-home mother while her husband worked in construction, according to neighbors who knew her before she gave birth to her third child.

They said she was involved in her daughters' schooling and walked them to class in the family's working class La Habra neighborhood every day, although she spoke little English. When she learned she was expecting a son, she was excited, said Sonia Herrera, a neighbor whose daughter played with Hermosillo's children.

After the boy's birth, Hermosillo became withdrawn and serious, she said.

Medina said his wife was hospitalized for postpartum depression in June after she said she didn't want the boy. The baby had been diagnosed with congenital muscular torticollis — a twisting of the neck to one side — and wore a helmet to help correct his plagiocephaly, also known as flat-head syndrome, The Orange County Register reported.

Studies suggest that Hispanic women suffer from slightly higher rates of postpartum depression because many are first-generation immigrants and are removed from the social and cultural support systems that surround childbirth in many Latin American cultures, Morales said. A language barrier also prevents some immigrant women from getting help.

Hermosillo's husband said his wife took medication after her hospitalization and had seen a therapist for the first time on Monday. Later that day, she scooped up the baby while her husband was watching their daughters, and left their second-story apartment.

A panicked Medina called 911 to report his wife and son missing. La Habra police has declined to release that call, citing the pending investigation.

Authorities say she pushed the baby from the parking garage at the hospital, where he had been undergoing physical therapy twice a week. He didn't have an appointment that day.

A witness saw the baby falling through the air and several people called 911, said Sgt. Dan Adams, an Orange police spokesman.

Surveillance video showed Hermosillo's sport utility vehicle with an empty child seat leaving the parking structure a short time later, Adams said. The license plate was traced to the Hermosillo home, the sergeant said.

A police officer driving past Children's Hospital about four hours later spotted Hermosillo driving on a street about 100 yards from the crime scene and arrested her, Adams said.

Hermosillo has been put in a protective gown in the medical ward of the county jail so she cannot hurt herself and is on suicide watch, said Jim Amormino, a spokesman for the Orange County Sheriff's Department. He said she also has an immigration hold because authorities believe she is in the country illegally.

Hermosillo tried to enter the country at a San Diego border crossing using someone else's identity in 2006 and was turned away, said Lori Haley, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Women who have been through postpartum depression said they can understand Hermosillo's alleged actions through the lens of their own mental illness. Tiffany Benton, of San Jose, suffered postpartum depression after the birth of both of her children, now 8 and 11.

Benton, 39, said she would dream about pushing her infant in a stroller down a steep slope and letting go of the carriage. She said she was afraid to bathe her daughter because she didn't trust herself not to drown her.

Benton went three weeks without sleeping at one point and was hospitalized for two weeks after the birth of her younger child when she began hallucinating, she said.

Now healthy, Benton takes medication and goes to therapy, but she has cut her medicine dose in half and hopes to taper off completely with time.

"I was just a disaster emotionally. I felt like I was going crazy and I was having panic attacks," Benton recalled in a phone interview. "My husband had no clue what was going on. He was like, 'Oh, you'll be fine tomorrow,' and I was like, 'No, no, I won't.'"

'Migrant' held by Coast Guard overstayed visa (Gloucester Times)

2011-08-26T10:22:00.002-04:00

'Migrant' held by Coast Guard overstayed visa
By Richard Gaines
Staff Writer

August 25, 2011

The individual removed from a New Bedford fishing boat and described by the Coast Guard as an "undocumented migrant" entered the U.S. under a visa waiver program that allows citizens of participating nations to travel in the country on pleasure and business for up to 90 days, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Because the unidentified individual "failed to depart the country as required, and remained in the U.S. without authorization," he was turned over to the ICE's enforcement and removal branch for deportation.

The individual's nationality was not revealed in a written exchange with the Times.

The matter, the second in two weeks involving a boat owned in part or whole by Carlos Raphael, New Bedford's pre-eminent commercial fishing entrepreneur, and a member of the board of the Gloucester-based Northeast Seafood Coalition, could result in federal charges, according to Coast Guard and Department of Homeland Security spokesmen.

However, neither agency was willing to provide a report on the status of the matter, which began on Aug. 13 when the cutter Legere stopped and boarded the 81-foot F/V Southern Crusader II about 60 miles southeast of Nantucket, according to Coast Guard spokesman Jeff Hall.

Raphael's attorney John Markey said he has been in contact with Raphael, who is vacationing in Portugal, and is not aware of any charges against his client. Markey said he did not know the identity of the person taken from the Southern Crusader II.

"Given the facts that have now been disclosed," said Markey, "it is patently clear that neither Mr. Raphael nor anyone in his employ were attempting to do anything illegal in this matter."

Raphael is listed as co-owner of the Southern Crusader II along with Joao Camarao. Raphael's company, R & C Fishing Corp., also owns the Vila Nova Do Corvo II, a 94 foot scalloper, which was boarded a week earlier.

During what was described as a random boarding, a constructed hollow was found in the hull, said the Coast Guard spokesman Hall. He described the void as "large enough for a person to get into." Such cavities sometimes are used to hide fish, but at the time of the boarding, the Vila Nova Do Corvo II was returning to port from a scalloping trip and the void was empty, the Coast Guard said.

"To our knowledge," Markey said in a telephone interview Wednesday, "(the void) existed before Mr. Raphael purchased the boat."

The NOAA vessel notification data base does not indicate when Raphael and Camarao purchased the boat but it was built in 1980, which was the same year Raphael, who emigrated from Corvo — an Azorean island, which is a part of Portugal — began building his fishing business.

The boat had four previous corporate owners and two previous names, Sandra Lee and Cajun Love, according to the data base at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

According to the Coast Guard spokesman Hall, the captain was cited for operating with a sealed compartment inconsistent with the mission of the boat. We will write it up and send it to enforcement" where lawyers will "look at the plain language and decide what US code to cite."

Whether or not to charge the boat owner or operator, Hall said, would be decided at a higher level and if there is to be a charge it would likely be prosecuted in the civil, Coast Guard administrative law judge system, said Hall.

Raphael's fleet of 40 scalloping and fishing boats based in New Bedford, is the largest in the nation's number one port in terms of landed value and probably the largest in the region.

Kicking and spitting, Iraqi arrested as illegal immigrant, feds say (The Detroit News)

2011-08-25T19:34:00.002-04:00

Kicking and spitting, Iraqi arrested as illegal immigrant, feds say

Robert Snell/ The Detroit News

Last Updated: August 25. 2011 11:22AM

Detroit— An Iraqi facing deportation threatened to kill an immigration officer with a shard of Plexiglas, spit on another federal agent and caused more than $700 damage to a police car Friday, according to court records.

The records, filed late Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Detroit, chronicle the break that kept 41-year-old Salam Daniel in the United States and a violent, harrowing trip in the back of a police cruiser in Dearborn.

Daniel was charged in federal court Wednesday with damaging government property and assaulting an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer with a dangerous weapon.

The alleged incident happened when federal agents caught Daniel on Friday following a long hunt.

A federal immigration judge ordered Daniel to be deported in August 1997 because he was living in the country illegally, according to court records.

He filed a series of appeals and was supposed to be deported in October 1999.

But due to conditions in Iraq, the government couldn't remove Daniel and he was allowed to stay. He was required to periodically report to the Department of Homeland Security, however.

In February 2008, Daniel failed to check in and was considered an immigration fugitive, according to court records.

He avoided capture until Friday, when Daniel entered a U.S. Immigration & Citizenship Services office in Detroit and asked about obtaining an employment card. Daniel was arrested, handcuffed and transported to a jail in Dearborn.

"During transportation, Daniel became irate and managed to maneuver his restrained hands under his legs so that they were now in front of his body," deportation Officer Trent Horky wrote in a court filing Wednesday. "Daniel violently kicked, punched and threw his body into (the) partition that divided his backseat bench from the (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) officer who was driving."

Daniels broke the Plexiglas partition, grabbed a shard, held it like a knife and started waving it at the officer, according to Horky. Daniel threatened to kill the officer, who was trying to drive the car, Horky wrote.

The officer managed to arrive at the Dearborn Police Department.

"Daniel made multiple attempts to spit at ICE officers and successfully did spit on one ICE officer," Horky wrote.

He continued to kick, fight, spit and wave the broken Plexiglas at officers until they disarmed him by using pepper spray, according to court records.

Daniel was restrained and taken to the St. Clair County Jail.

CRIME REPORTS: 08/25/11 (Sierra Vista Herald)

2011-08-25T09:35:00.001-04:00

CRIME REPORTS: 08/25/11
Sierra Vista police

The following are highlights from the calls for service or citizen contacts received or initiated by the Sierra Vista Police Department after Aug. 22 at 6 a.m. through Aug. 24 at 12:07 a.m.

Aug. 20
7:24 a.m. Three illegal immigrants were taken into custody on Hwy 80 near mile post 346 and turned over to the U.S. Border Patrol.

Aug. 18
3:13 a.m. One illegal immigrant was located at Safeway and turned over to the U.S. Border Patrol.

False alarm on reported "hootenanny" (Cleveland Sun News)

2011-08-25T00:22:00.001-04:00

False alarm on reported "hootenanny"- Avon Police Blotter
Published: Wednesday, August 17, 2011, 7:50 AM
By Sun News staff Sun Sentinel

SUSPICIOUS CONDITION, SCHWARTZ ROAD: Police received a report on Aug. 6 from a nearby resident about two carloads of “illegal immigrants” at the east end of the park who were changing clothes in plain sight, acting in an intimidating manner and who the caller thought were preparing to have some kind of “hootenanny.” Police arrived on the scene to find the suspects were preparing to play a soccer game. They were advised about changing in plain sight.

Suwanee Police Blotter: Aug. 19 (Suwanee, GA Patch)

2011-08-25T00:20:00.001-04:00

Suwanee Police Blotter: Aug. 19
* August 19, 2011

The following arrest information was supplied by the Gwinnett County Sheriff's Department and the Gwinnett Police Department. It does not indicate a conviction.

Juan Carlos Perez-Cruz of a Peachtree Industrial Boulevard address in Suwanee was booked into the Gwinnett Detention Center on Thursday.

Charges include DUI, no driver's license, and an immigration charge, according to Sheriff's Department officials.

Gwinnett Police was the arresting agency. Further details were not available.

Pair ask DHS official to end fingerprint program (AP c/o Houston Chronicle)

2011-08-25T00:08:00.001-04:00

Pair ask DHS official to end fingerprint program
ALICIA A. CALDWELL, Associated Press
Updated 09:50 p.m., Wednesday, August 24, 2011

ARLINGTON, Va. (AP) — Two Maryland women facing deportation pleaded with a Homeland Security official Wednesday to end a program that gives federal immigration authorities access to fingerprints of people arrested.

Speaking in Spanish, Maria Bolanos told Marc Rapp, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement acting assistant director for the Secure Communities program, that she was arrested after calling police in Maryland during a fight with her partner. She was arrested, she said, and accused of illegally selling telephone calling cards. Now she's facing deportation because her fingerprints were shared with immigration authorities and she was identified as an illegal immigrant as part of the Secure Communities program.

"I'm not a criminal," Bolanos said, adding that she fears being separated from her young daughter.

Bolanos, who was joined by Florinda Lorenzo, confronted Rapp during a public hearing on the Secure Communities program, which allows immigration authorities to use fingerprints sent to the FBI to identify illegal immigrants arrested around the country.

After Bolanos and Lorenzo confronted Rapp, who did not respond, about 200 people walked out of the meeting, chanting "end it, don't amend it."

Gustavo Andrade, an organizing director for Casa Maryland, asked the panel to resign before leading the protesters out.

Similar scenes have played out at other public hearings on Secure Communities in Dallas, Los Angeles, and Chicago.

Rapp declined to comment on the confrontation.

It was the fourth public forum held by members of a Homeland Security task force asked to come up with recommendations to improve the program, which critics contend has resulted in the deportation of thousands of people arrested on minor traffic offenses or other misdemeanors. Critics have also complained that states are being forced to participate in the program, despite initial assurances that the program was optional.

Earlier this month, ICE Director John Morton announced the agency was canceling previously signed agreements with states, saying that state permission was not needed for the fingerprint-sharing program.

Gary Mead, who leads ICE's enforcement and removal operations, said immigration officials are working to focus their efforts on criminals, repeated immigration violators and immigration fugitives. He said a June memo from ICE Director John Morton outlining when and how officials could use discretion in deportation cases — including in cases of people with no criminal history and those who were brought to the United States as children — was proof of that effort.

Last week, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced in a letter to senators supporting immigration reform that each of the approximately 300,000 cases pending in federal immigration court would be reviewed on a case-by-case basis and those with no criminal record would have their cases indefinitely put on hold.

Lorenzo, who spoke to a group of supporters before Wednesday's meeting, said she was pleased to hear about the policy change, but she still worries.

"I am fighting to stay here and not be separated from my children," the mother of three said.

The task force, which does not include Homeland Security or any other federal officials, is expected to make recommendations for changes to the Secure Communities program in September.

After two-month gang crackdown, San Jose cops sever ties with feds (San Jose Mercury News)

2011-08-25T00:02:00.001-04:00

After two-month gang crackdown, San Jose cops sever ties with feds

By Mike Rosenberg

Posted: 08/24/2011 05:16:59 PM PDT

Driven by a dramatic drop in gang killings coupled with community fears that law-abiding undocumented residents would be deported, San Jose police on Wednesday ended their brief alliance with federal immigration agents.

Police Chief Chris Moore seemed to declare victory in the department's 2-month-old "war on gangs" in saying the department -- still reeling from severe budget cuts and layoffs -- could now afford to sever ties with two U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

The ICE agents had joined the force June 24 to stem a steep rise of gang violence that had helped put the city on track for its highest homicide rate since the 1980s. In the first 5½ months of the year, the city recorded 14 gang homicides, but none in the two months since the department's elite 38-member METRO unit began focusing on "all gangs, all the time," Moore said. With the help of the ICE agents, he said, police arrested some 215 gang members.

Yet the police force is also facing sharp criticism from community groups who say residents have feared calling police to report crimes or serve as witnesses because they did not want the ICE agents to deport them.

"I definitely think (ending the ICE relationship) is a move in the right direction and I hope (Moore) stays open to talking to us," said Zelica Rodriguez, policy director for Service, Immigrants Rights and Education Network. "It's a reminder of the promises he made when he was a candidate for chief."

Although police spokesman Sgt. Jason Dwyer said the community concerns played a role in the chief's decision, it was the drop in violence that had the largest effect.

"Are we crumbling to the community pressure? Absolutely not," Dwyer said. "If we were still getting bombarded with homicides, those guys wouldn't be going anywhere. We accomplished what we set out to do, we've completely stopped" the gang homicides.

But it may have come with a cost. In interviews Wednesday, community group leaders -- who met with the chief several times over the issue -- reported what they called disturbing changes in how police were targeting minorities and a drop in trust between officers and residents since the crackdown launched.

The testimonials mounted: They say a four-member officer unit had pulled over a Latino pastor for not using his turn signal. One Hispanic mother who witnessed a beating in front of her home was too scared to call police because they might check her immigration status. Another man said he had been driving as little as possible to avoid the risk of being pulled over, and a mom said she fears her teenage Latino son will be profiled by police whenever he goes out.

"We've looked at cost analysis of what it means to our community, this fear and intimidation that happened. The cost surely outweighs the benefits," said Maritza Maldonado, a 25-year veteran of the community group PACT. Her East San Jose church surveyed 1,800 parishioners, and found 90 percent reported a desire for a better relationship with police.

They remain bitter that Moore never consulted with them before deciding to team with ICE and have been meeting constantly with him to persuade him to end the partnership, and to consult with them before embarking on new initiatives.

Still, no examples have surfaced proving their main concern -- that law-abiding citizens without documentation would be targeted and deported -- ever became a reality.

Now the police will face fire from the opposite end of the spectrum, led by a coalition of five conservative groups who formed to support the ICE plan. They now fear violence will tick back up if police relax their crackdown. Dwyer said the reduction in gang focus would be extremely gradual.

During the two-month crackdown, called "Operation Community Shield," the gang unit made 314 arrests, seized 23 weapons, and conducted more than 500 gang-related searches, police said. Of the people arrested, 69 percent were involved in gangs and 35 percent were repeat offenders.

"If it's been working, why stop?" said Don Barich, a spokesman for the pro-ICE coalition. "With the budget cutbacks and the manpower challenges the force is facing, it would seem like a good use of resources as far as we're concerned."

ICE issued a statement saying it looked forward to working with other local police departments to "dismantle criminal organizations that threaten the welfare of our communities."

"(The partnership) achieved the desired results, reducing gang-related crime and violence," Clark Settles, ICE's special agent in charge, said in a statement.

Students hold sit-in at immigration building in LA (AP c/o San Jose Mercury News)

2011-08-25T00:01:00.001-04:00

Students hold sit-in at immigration building in LA
The Associated Press
Posted: 08/24/2011 07:36:48 PM PDT

LOS ANGELES—Activists say nine illegal immigrant students and their supporters were arrested in demonstrations at immigration offices in Los Angeles over a fingerprint sharing program.

Youth activist Mohammad Abdollahi says five illegal immigrant students and graduates held a sit-in Wednesday at the building where federal officers ready immigrants for deportation.

Abdollahi says officers detained them and one supporter and released them several hours later.

He says three activists who rallied outside were arrested by police for failing to disperse.

Critics say the program giving Immigration and Customs Enforcement access to arrestees' fingerprints has caused the deportation of many for minor infractions. Supporters say it helps identify immigrants convicted of crimes.

Homeland Security spokesman Matt Chandler says the six arrests were executed by the Federal Protective Service. No additional details were released.

Role of police in deportations debated again (Worcester Telegram & Gazette)

2011-08-24T13:41:00.002-04:00

Role of police in deportations debated again
By Brian Lee TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

MILFORD — A horrific fatal accident Saturday has reignited the debate over a federal program that prioritizes the deportation of illegal immigrants who have criminal records.

Police Chief Thomas J. O’Loughlin said yesterday that the program, the Secure Communities Act, “would have clearly looked at” the record of Nicholas Guaman, who allegedly was driving drunk when he struck and killed a motorcyclist, dragging him a quarter of a mile.

The 34-year-old Milford resident has pleaded not guilty to vehicular homicide, driving under the influence of alcohol, leaving the scene of an accident involving personal injury and death, possession of an open container, failing to stop for police, unlicensed driving, failing to yield at a stop sign, wanton or reckless conduct creating risk to a child, and resisting arrest.

A native of Ecuador, Mr. Guaman was ordered held on $100,000 cash bail at his arraignment Monday in Milford District Court. He is also being investigated by federal immigration officials and was held on a detainer from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Under Secure Communities, when someone is arrested his or her fingerprints are transmitted to the FBI and U.S. Department of Homeland Security, with a copy to state police. This happens regardless of whether the person is suspected of being an illegal immigrant. The program also allows ICE to look at the charges and determine whether the detainee is someone ICE should focus on.

Mr. Guaman was previously convicted of breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony, and on three assault and battery charges, as well as several other charges stemming from a Feb. 3, 2008, incident.

Chief O’Loughlin said yesterday he favors the federal program operated by Homeland Security. He said Milford has a sizable population from Ecuador, Guatemala and Brazil.

“I arrest someone, they tell me their name, date of birth, where they live locally, and I don’t know if any of that is true. It’s not like I can call town hall somewhere in Ecuador and say, ‘Can you verify this?’ I’m stuck in that respect,” the chief said.

Opponents of Secure Communities say it will create a divide between immigrant communities and police.

Chief O’Loughlin said he doesn’t think that argument is valid. He said it was a Brazilian who tipped off police here to two men who were wanted for murder in Brazil.

The state controls what Chief O’Loughlin referred to as the “switch” to link with Homeland Security, and the governor, after holding public hearings throughout the state this year, opted not to enter the program.

Speaking at her home yesterday, former state representative Marie J. Parente said this was the third time a Milfordian has been killed by an unlicensed driver who was in the country illegally.

Ms. Parente estimated 3,000 illegal immigrants are residing in Milford, a town of about 28,000 people. About 10 percent of illegal immigrants drive without licenses, she estimated.

A state representative from 1980 to 2006, Ms. Parente has expressed her support of the Secure Communities Act in a letter to President Obama. She said that people enter the country illegally because they know they will enjoy more benefits than citizens.

“The road to citizenship is not torture,” she said. “All societies, no matter how primitive, have rules to preserve that group. Ours are you have a physical, you’re not a criminal coming into our country, you’re healthy, you have a way to support yourself, and a place to live.”

Ms. Parente said Mr. Guaman had the chance of a lifetime living undercover as he and his family enjoyed all kinds of benefits. “Still that wasn’t enough,” she said, adding that the accident and death has “ripped the hearts of Milfordians. They are furious in this town.”

Worcester County Sheriff Lewis G. Evangelidis also denounced the accident, calling it a tragedy that “highlights the immediate need for the implementation of the Secure Communities Act.”

He said it was implausible to think that Gov. Deval L. Patrick would not reconsider his position on this issue and begin to immediately enact Secure Communities.

Alex Goldstein, a spokesman for Mr. Patrick, said Massachusetts already voluntarily shares fingerprint data with the federal government. The governor’s policy is that serious criminals who are here illegally should be deported. Massachusetts has and will continue to send fingerprints to the federal government and the state Department of Correction will continue to work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to facilitate removal of undocumented immigrants who have been convicted of felonies in the state, Mr. Goldstein said.

“Our deepest condolences go out to the family and friends of the victim of this terrible crime. The focus now is on prosecuting the person responsible and ensuring that justice is served. We will provide whatever assistance is required to get that done,” Mr. Goldstein said.

Mr. Guaman is accused of being drunk when he allegedly ran a stop sign about 7:45 p.m. Saturday and struck the motorcycle driven by Matthew Denice, 23, of Milford. Witnesses told police Mr. Denice was stuck in the wheel well of Mr. Guaman’s pickup and was dragged about a quarter of a mile, despite people chasing the truck and banging on the sides screaming at the driver to stop.

Leslie L. Wheeler, a local resident whose husband is a Brazilian national, called the accident “awful,” but she disagreed with characterizations of illegal immigrants. She said they generally want nothing more than to work hard for better lives and leave others alone.

A. Wayne Sampson, executive director of the Grafton-based Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association, said police chiefs have very divergent views on Secure Communities, the concept of which will be a federal mandate in 2012 or 2013.

Mr. Sampson, the former Shrewsbury police chief, said sharing information makes sense, but the question becomes, “How will the federal government use it?”

A lot of communities are having problems with the implementation of the program, he said. “Does the Commonwealth or does the federal government have the capacity to actually implement a total program?”

He said it has been reported to him that when police call ICE to tell them they have detained a person who appears to be an illegal immigrant, “in most cases they will tell you to go ahead and bail them and let them go because they don’t have anyone to come and bail them or come and get them. They’re selective in who they come out for.

“So if we don’t have the capacity now, what are they going to do when there’s full implementation of the program? This is the reality of any program,” he said. “You have to understand what the impact is going to be.”

Sheriff slams president's illegals stance (The Marietta Daily Journal)

2011-08-23T22:21:00.001-04:00

Sheriff slams president's illegals stance
by Lindsay Field
The Marietta Daily Journal
August 23, 2011 12:00 AM

MARIETTA - Cobb County Sheriff Neil Warren said that he has a problem with President Obama's announcement last week to go easy on illegal immigrants in the U.S. and focus only on deporting those who are violent criminals.

"I really believe that because of our economy being in such bad shape now .... and with all of his failed policies on jobs and stimulus, I think he's looking for votes," Warren said. "I think he's lost credibility with voters who voted for him."

In July 2007, the Cobb County Sheriff's Office was approved by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency to detain illegal immigrants per the 287(g) program. According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the 287(g) program allows a state and local law enforcement officials to delegate immigration enforcement within their jurisdictions.

"I don't think it's right. These policies aren't going to do anything but send an invitation out to more aliens to enter our country illegally," Warren added. "Whether they bring illegal drugs or simply are looking for drugs, I think it's going to create a burden on the taxpayers of the United States."

However, Warren does not think that the policy change will have an impact on the way he and his staff perform their duties at the county jail.

"We are going to continue to do what we've done, that's enforce the laws," Warren said. "Whatever that may be, we're going to do it equally."

In 2010, of the 31,050 inmates booked in the Cobb County Jail, 1,695 were illegal immigrants reported to ICE. Between Jan. 1 and July 31, 2011, Warren said that among the 16,575 inmates booked, the department has placed immigration holds and started initial deportation proceeding against 755 illegal immigrants.

With each person that is booked in the jail, one of Warren's 20 deputies who is authorized to act as immigration officers under the supervision of ICE, are checked for citizenship. Warren said process is practiced nationwide.

"If you are a citizen of a foreign country, then I'm responsible to notify your country that you're here," he said.

Weekly data proves to Warren that taking illegal immigrants into custody and reporting them to ICE when needed is a benefit to the community.

"Of those 190 (arrested) last week, everyone of those individuals has charges pending. They committed some violation of the local or state law here in Cobb County," Warren said. "Over two-thirds were for felony charges. The other third were for misdemeanors."

Warren said that he does believe the policy change will additionally create issues for federal law enforcement agencies.

"I just think that the Department of Homeland Security is choosing to selectively enforce the immigration laws," said Warren, adding that the burden will come on the border patrol and ICE officers who are charged with removing offenders.

Prior to 287(g) being added to the Cobb County Sheriff's Office in 2007, Warren said that his department partnered with the Immigration and Naturalization Services to deal with the illegal immigration problems.

"We saw that as a problem here years ago but it was unofficial and they tried to work with us to deal with the problem," Warren said. "We didn't have the resources because the folks in Washington didn't want to provide the resources. I applied for it (in 2005) and come to find out, we were the first sheriff's office in the state to apply for it and probably among the first 10 in the United States."

Since applying for the 287(g) program, Warren said his department has seen a reduction in the number of illegal immigrants who come through the county jail.

"Since we started this program, the numbers that I've looked at, are down about 50 percent," Warren said.

On Sunday, Fox and Friends anchors interviewed Warren because he is considered one of "America's Top 10 Toughest Immigration Sheriffs," according to previous reports by the news affiliate.

The live feed included Warren answering questions about his take on the policy change by President Obama.

"I'm very passionate about the 287(g) program," Warren said. "If you're going to be in our country, there's a right way to do it. Our country was built on immigrants coming here, making the United States what it is. There's 1,000s and 1,000s doing it the right way and I just have a heartburn for folks who circumvent the law."

"I don't deport anybody... I don't even have the authority to hold them in custody on an ICE situation. I do that based on ICE telling me," Warren said. "The argument is that I'm splitting up families. Because they are accused of making bad decisions, that's what is splitting up families."

Richard Pellegrino, director of Cobb Immigrant Alliance, said that he is ecstatic about the president's move.

"That's really what the policy should have been from the beginning of his administration," Pellegrino said about the president's policy change. "It's a good step forward in terms of protecting families and those who are not criminals."

Pellegrino added that his constituents are "cautiously optimistic, because they are aware it is political season."

Arlington hearing on deportations attracts protestors (Washington Examiner)

2011-08-23T22:14:00.001-04:00

Arlington hearing on deportations attracts protestors
By: Liz Essley | Examiner Staff Writer | 08/23/11 8:05 PM

Hispanics and immigration advocates plan to swarm to Arlington Wednesday to protest a federal law requiring local police to check the immigration status of those they detain and to turn any criminals over to the Department of Homeland Security for deportation.

The protestors intend to gather at a DHS hearing on the controversial program, known as Secure Communities, which has drawn similar demonstrations around the country because it has led to the deportation of many Hispanics who are not the violent felons the program is supposed to target.

While supporters say Secure Communities is essential to a working immigration policy, critics have attacked the program for scaring immigrant communities, saying people who have committed only minor traffic infractions are being deported along with convicted felons.

"Secure Communities uses taxpayer dollars to essentially widen the deportation dragnet to be able to catch individuals who pose no threat to public safety," said Gustavo Andrade of Casa de Maryland, an advocacy organization that will have representatives testifying at the meeting while others protest it outside.

President Obama announced earlier this month he would review 300,000 deportation cases and allow those illegal immigrants who don't have criminal records to stay. But Hispanic groups and immigration advocates say that's not enough, and are pushing to do away with Secure Communities.

"I would like to hear concrete evidence that in my case I will not be deported," said Maria Bolanos, 28, of Hyattsville, who faces deportation after Prince George's police referred her case to DHS. She plans to testify at the hearing.

Arlington County leaders asked Immigration and Customs Enforcement if they could opt out of the program last year only to be told by federal authorities that participation was mandatory for all localities.

"This at a minimum has been a communication disaster for ICE," said county board member Walter Tejada. "They have given conflicting statement after conflicting statement, and that has not helped us at all."

The DHS task force conducting the hearing at George Mason University's Founders Hall between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. held similar meetings in Dallas, Los Angeles and Chicago. In Chicago, 10 protesters were arrested after about 200 walked out of the hearing chanting, "Terminate the program! No more lies," according to a Chicago Sun-Times report.

Activists said they thought the public input meetings were only a formality for DHS and would not stop the DHS from going forward with the program.

Feds release first illegal immigrants in Georgia (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

2011-08-23T22:10:00.003-04:00

Feds release first illegal immigrants in Georgia

By Jeremy Redmon

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Federal authorities on Tuesday night began freeing illegal immigrants facing deportation from Georgia, releasing two teenagers from custody by using controversial new guidelines the Obama administration announced last week.

Homeland Security Department officials confirmed that Pedro Morales, 19, of Dalton and Luis “Ricky” Hernandez, 18, of Calhoun had been let out of the Stewart Detention Center in South Georgia and their cases dismissed.

By freeing illegal immigrants, critics say, the Obama administration is ignoring federal immigration laws. They also contend the government has not done enough to stem the flow of illegal immigrants to Georgia.

However, proponents of the new policy said it made sense for the government to focus its limited resources on killers, rapists and terrorists. They were hoping this would lead to the eventual passage of the Dream Act. That measure — which failed in Congress last year — would give illegal immigrants a path to legal status if they came here as children, graduated from high school and attended college or served in the military.

Charles Kuck, the teens’ attorney, said Immigration and Customs Enforcement dropped efforts on Friday to deport Morales and Hernandez to Mexico after he argued they met some of the criteria in the guidelines: Both were brought to Georgia as young children, educated here and had not committed crimes other than being in the country illegally. Each was arrested last summer during traffic stops in Whitfield County, Kuck said.

Issuing a statement Tuesday night, Homeland Security said ICE “is focused on smart, effective immigration enforcement that prioritizes the removal of criminal aliens, recent border crossers and egregious immigration law violators, such as those who have been previously removed from the U.S. The agency exercises prosecutorial discretion, on a case-by-case basis, as necessary to focus resources on these priorities.”

The Obama administration announced the new federal guidelines last week, saying the government had limited resources for deporting and detaining illegal immigrants and must focus on expelling violent criminals and those who pose threats to national security.

The government is preparing to review about 300,000 cases before the immigration courts nationwide to see if they should continue or be dismissed, an action that has strong opposition.

“They are illegal immigrants and they need to be returned to their country like the law states,” said Lori Pesta, president of the Republican Women of Cherokee County. “This is a nation of laws. ... And the laws are there for a reason -- so we don’t live in chaos.”

Kuck, the past president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said ICE’s decision to free his clients indicates “there is a return of some semblance of sanity to our [immigration] system.”

The families for Hernandez and Morales cheered the news of the teens’ release. Hernandez’ sister said relatives were traveling to the Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin to pick up her brother.

“It’s wonderful news,” said Lisbeth Hernandez, 21. “The only thing we want to do right now is hug him.”

Hernandez said her parents illegally brought her brother into the country from Mexico when he was 2. He was arrested on June 17 after police pulled over a car he was riding in and questioned him about his immigration status, she said. Hernandez was charged with possession of marijuana but that charge was dropped, Kuck said.

Before his arrest, Hernandez was ready to start his senior year at Gordon Central High School, where he competed on the varsity wrestling and soccer teams, his sister said.

Morales was preparing to study mechanics at Georgia Northwestern Technical College before he was arrested on June 19. He was illegally brought into the United States from Mexico when he was 7, according to Kuck’s law firm.

“I am glad because I had two months without my son, believing that he was going to be deported,” Morales’ father, Pedro, said. “That was so hard for me.”