Undocumented immigrants being set free
Sheriff, federal agency at odds on caught immigrants
Undocumented immigrants being set free
Michael Kiefer
The Arizona Republic
Jul. 20, 2006 12:00 AM
Maricopa County Jail inmates convicted or cleared of human-smuggling charges and presumed to be undocumented were allowed to walk out of jail without being removed from the country because of a spat over jurisdiction between the Sheriff's Office and federal immigration agents.
Since the first arrests made under Arizona's human-smuggling law in March, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office has filed 268 cases, 31 against suspected coyotes and the rest against suspected conspirators assumed to be undocumented immigrants.
So far, 63 have pleaded guilty to lesser offenses, 15 have been dismissed, two acquitted and one convicted by a jury. advertisement
But 17 have walked right out of the jail and into the community - including six who pleaded guilty to human-smuggling felonies - because the U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency decided it wouldn't transport out of the country people prosecuted under the controversial coyote law.
Instead, they slipped unnoticed through the red tape of a giant jail system and onto the streets.
Since July 11, the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office has transported 14 more of the coyote-law defendants in four trips to the Yuma area to rendezvous with U.S. Border Patrol agents willing to take the prisoners and put them through the federal process for removal.
"Why would they refuse to pick up the felons?" Sheriff Joe Arpaio asked.
Because, according to an ICE spokesman, only federal agents with ICE, the Border Patrol and other U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials are legally empowered to determine who is a citizen and who is in the country legally, which they do through specific interviews and checks.
"An officer must base the determination of status upon either an interview of the subject or through fingerprint comparison with existing records," ICE Special Agent in Charge Roberto Medina said in a July 6 letter to Arpaio. "Furthermore, only federal officers . . . can place detainers pursuant to the (Immigration and Nationality Act)."
State and county law enforcement can't make such determinations about "alienage."
Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas was distressed.
"ICE's refusal to pick up and deport acknowledged illegal immigrants arrested by local law enforcement shows that the federal policy of 'catch and release' is still the order of the day," he said. "The federal government's continued unwillingness to perform its basic duty of securing our border makes Arizona's human-smuggling law all the more important."
According to the Sheriff's Office, there are an average of 900 to 1,000 prisoners in the jail at any one time with immigration detainers, or holds, indicating that ICE is to be contacted before they can be released.
ICE picks up prisoners every weekday. According to ICE spokesman Russell Ahr, for example, the agency picked up 165 immigration detainees between June 11 and July 12. According to the Sheriff's Office, the agency picked up 23 on Monday alone. But they refused to take the person in the group who had been prosecuted under the coyote law.
Ahr claimed ICE decisions are based on priorities: prior criminal history, immigration status, nationality and the nature of the crime they're accused of.
"The purpose of a detainer is not to have an illegal alien removed; the purpose is to have a criminal alien removed," he said.
When suspects are booked into Maricopa County jails, they are questioned on their immigration status. And if the interviewing officers doubt the suspect's immigration status, they send a teletyped message to ICE, which responds with its decision of whether to place a detainer on that suspect after running the information through its databanks.
Arpaio claimed that 35 of the suspects charged with human-smuggling violations had immigration holds that were later removed.
The reasoning for dropping the holds, according to Medina's letter, was that even though the suspects were being held on suspicion of human smuggling, which presupposes they are here illegally, ICE officials determined their interviews had not been conducted by qualified ICE personnel.
"In which case it should be incumbent on them to do an interview," said MCSO Chief Michael Olson, who is in charge of the jails.
Instead, as the charges were dropped, or as the convicts were sentenced to probation, they were released by deputies because there were no holds against them.
The lapse was discovered June 11 when a judge acquitted two men of conspiracy to commit smuggling and MCSO personnel called to have them transported from the jail.
When ICE refused, Arpaio announced he would have his own deputies do the transport.
"Now we have to waste our manpower," Arpaio said. "I don't have to do this. I can just let them go on the street. Who cares? Because they're convicted felons. They deserve to go back to Mexico because a judge said they're going back to Mexico. He didn't say how."
Copyright © 2006, azcentral.com. All rights reserved.
Undocumented immigrants being set free
Michael Kiefer
The Arizona Republic
Jul. 20, 2006 12:00 AM
Maricopa County Jail inmates convicted or cleared of human-smuggling charges and presumed to be undocumented were allowed to walk out of jail without being removed from the country because of a spat over jurisdiction between the Sheriff's Office and federal immigration agents.
Since the first arrests made under Arizona's human-smuggling law in March, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office has filed 268 cases, 31 against suspected coyotes and the rest against suspected conspirators assumed to be undocumented immigrants.
So far, 63 have pleaded guilty to lesser offenses, 15 have been dismissed, two acquitted and one convicted by a jury. advertisement
But 17 have walked right out of the jail and into the community - including six who pleaded guilty to human-smuggling felonies - because the U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency decided it wouldn't transport out of the country people prosecuted under the controversial coyote law.
Instead, they slipped unnoticed through the red tape of a giant jail system and onto the streets.
Since July 11, the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office has transported 14 more of the coyote-law defendants in four trips to the Yuma area to rendezvous with U.S. Border Patrol agents willing to take the prisoners and put them through the federal process for removal.
"Why would they refuse to pick up the felons?" Sheriff Joe Arpaio asked.
Because, according to an ICE spokesman, only federal agents with ICE, the Border Patrol and other U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials are legally empowered to determine who is a citizen and who is in the country legally, which they do through specific interviews and checks.
"An officer must base the determination of status upon either an interview of the subject or through fingerprint comparison with existing records," ICE Special Agent in Charge Roberto Medina said in a July 6 letter to Arpaio. "Furthermore, only federal officers . . . can place detainers pursuant to the (Immigration and Nationality Act)."
State and county law enforcement can't make such determinations about "alienage."
Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas was distressed.
"ICE's refusal to pick up and deport acknowledged illegal immigrants arrested by local law enforcement shows that the federal policy of 'catch and release' is still the order of the day," he said. "The federal government's continued unwillingness to perform its basic duty of securing our border makes Arizona's human-smuggling law all the more important."
According to the Sheriff's Office, there are an average of 900 to 1,000 prisoners in the jail at any one time with immigration detainers, or holds, indicating that ICE is to be contacted before they can be released.
ICE picks up prisoners every weekday. According to ICE spokesman Russell Ahr, for example, the agency picked up 165 immigration detainees between June 11 and July 12. According to the Sheriff's Office, the agency picked up 23 on Monday alone. But they refused to take the person in the group who had been prosecuted under the coyote law.
Ahr claimed ICE decisions are based on priorities: prior criminal history, immigration status, nationality and the nature of the crime they're accused of.
"The purpose of a detainer is not to have an illegal alien removed; the purpose is to have a criminal alien removed," he said.
When suspects are booked into Maricopa County jails, they are questioned on their immigration status. And if the interviewing officers doubt the suspect's immigration status, they send a teletyped message to ICE, which responds with its decision of whether to place a detainer on that suspect after running the information through its databanks.
Arpaio claimed that 35 of the suspects charged with human-smuggling violations had immigration holds that were later removed.
The reasoning for dropping the holds, according to Medina's letter, was that even though the suspects were being held on suspicion of human smuggling, which presupposes they are here illegally, ICE officials determined their interviews had not been conducted by qualified ICE personnel.
"In which case it should be incumbent on them to do an interview," said MCSO Chief Michael Olson, who is in charge of the jails.
Instead, as the charges were dropped, or as the convicts were sentenced to probation, they were released by deputies because there were no holds against them.
The lapse was discovered June 11 when a judge acquitted two men of conspiracy to commit smuggling and MCSO personnel called to have them transported from the jail.
When ICE refused, Arpaio announced he would have his own deputies do the transport.
"Now we have to waste our manpower," Arpaio said. "I don't have to do this. I can just let them go on the street. Who cares? Because they're convicted felons. They deserve to go back to Mexico because a judge said they're going back to Mexico. He didn't say how."
Copyright © 2006, azcentral.com. All rights reserved.
posted by Walking Contradiction at 7/26/2006 03:57:00 AM
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