[Peace-discuss] FW: [police oversight] Virginia - Jails to report foreign inmates

[LAURIE]

Just thought I would forward this so everyone can get a look at what has
become of civil liberties and civil rights in Amerika, home of freedom,
justice, individualism, and the Amerikan form of non-totalitatianism. I
guess it is time that other countries around the world institute the same
policies against U.S. citizens and residents in order to protect themselves
against possible Amerikan terrorism.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: policeoversight at yahoogroups.com
> [mailto:policeoversight at yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of philipeure
> Sent: Monday, July 28, 2008 1:51 PM
> To: policeoversight at yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [police oversight] Virginia - Jails to report foreign inmates
> 
> The Washington Post
> 
> Va. Jails to Report Foreign Inmates
> New Law Targets Illegal Immigrants
> 
> By Bill Brubaker
> Washington Post Staff Writer
> Monday, July 28, 2008; A01
> 
> A year after Prince William County launched a crackdown on illegal
> immigrants, Virginia has implemented a law that requires something
> similar for every jurisdiction in the state. Jail officials are now
> required to notify federal authorities of all foreign-born inmates
> regardless of their immigration status.
> 
> The little-noticed law went into effect July 1 and aims to make
> every corner of the state as unwelcoming as Prince William for
> illegal immigrants charged with crimes.
> 
> "With our new law, these people who are here illegally should be
> afraid of living anywhere in Virginia right now," said Del. David B.
> Albo (R-Fairfax), who helped write the law and chairs the state's
> crime commission. "If you're here illegally, it's not any scarier to
> live in Prince William than in any other county."
> 
> Prince William and about 60 other jurisdictions nationwide had
> previously joined in a separate partnership with U.S. Immigration
> and Customs Enforcement officials to identify immigrants who have
> committed crimes. But now, under the Virginia law, officials across
> the state have begun routinely filing similar reports to the same
> federal authorities that Prince William does. Under the state law,
> local jails probably will spend a fraction of the $10.5 million
> Prince Willliam has budgeted over the next five years for the ICE
> partnership.
> 
> ICE cannot say how many illegal immigrants from a particular
> jurisdiction are being deported, only that it cannot remove as many
> as it would like because of budget limitations. So there are no
> statistics about what ultimately happens to the illegal immigrants
> who are reported to ICE -- either by way of the new state law or
> through the federal program, which trains local officers to identify
> and detain undocumented suspects charged with crimes.
> 
> ICE has $42 million for the partnership program this year, but
> officials at the agency say they need a lot more money to do the
> job. "We'd like to detain everyone. But that is a fantasy world,"
> said James Pendergraph, who oversees ICE's partnerships with state
> and local agencies.
> 
> Together, the federal program and the state law, passed in the
> aftermath of Congress's failure last summer to reform the
> immigration system, underscore how dissimilar enforcement policies
> are in the Washington region.
> 
> While Virginia jails have begun expediting reports to ICE on their
> foreign-born inmates, even if there is no evidence that they are
> undocumented, the Montgomery County jail sends federal authorities a
> weekly list of its immigrant inmates.
> 
> "We do no investigation for ICE," said Montgomery Department of
> Correction and Rehabilitation Director Arthur M. Wallenstein. "We
> are not agents of the ICE. We are a local branch of government."
> 
> And while Prince William's police and sheriff's departments will
> spend about $1.5 million this fiscal year to employ 16 ICE-trained
> officers and deputies for the program known as 287(g), Alexandria
> and Arlington County are leaving most of the immigration work to the
> federal agency.
> 
> "It's a federal responsibility," Arlington Sheriff Beth Arthur
> said. "I mean, in essence what is happening is, these 287(g)
> localities are taking on the responsibility of ICE, doing its job.
> And these localities are paying for it." The 287(g) program got its
> name from the section of the federal Immigration and Nationality Act
> that authorized it.
> 
> But Prince William officials are confident that they will identify
> more illegal immigrants through their partnership with ICE than they
> would under the state law.
> 
> Only 60 of the thousands of law enforcement agencies nationwide have
> joined the five-year-old ICE program. Many localities don't have the
> resources, Pendergraph said. Politics have also come into play: Some
> agencies got involved only after government leaders ordered them to
> do so.
> 
> Other local participants in the federal program are Herndon,
> Manassas, Manassas Park and, since early this month, Loudoun County.
> In Maryland, only Frederick County participates. The District has
> not signed on.
> 
> Fairfax County has applied to join the program, but Sheriff Stan
> Barry said last week that he might reconsider after he assesses the
> impact of the Virginia law.
> 
> "It may be that 287(g) is moot for us," he said. "One of the reasons
> we applied was to expedite identifying and processing illegal
> immigrants. But if we're going to end up with the very same results
> just by reporting [under the new law] and having ICE do the work,
> obviously there would be no reason to participate."
> 
> Under 287(g), a local officer is authorized to access an ICE
> database that contains fingerprints of known illegal immigrants. If
> the suspect is identified as undocumented, the officer is deputized
> to hold the inmate under a federal detainer.
> 
> In jails not in the federal program, officers typically have access
> to a separate ICE database that does not match fingerprints. These
> officers can follow up with ICE, which can investigate further. The
> most serious offenders are in jail anyway, so there is no rush to
> identify them. But many illegal immigrants charged with misdemeanors
> probably would be released on bond before being identified. ICE has
> not shown a willingness to deport many people charged with lesser
> crimes, experts said.
> 
> Prince William made national headlines last summer when it directed
> police officers to check the immigration status of all suspects,
> even before they were arrested. The policy left the county open to
> accusations of racial profiling, and many Hispanics, including legal
> residents, fled to jurisdictions they considered less hostile. In
> March, the Board of County Supervisors amended the policy to require
> immigration checks only after an arrest.
> 
> "Based on our interaction with ICE, I am pretty confident that our
> program is more intensive than what will evolve in those other
> jurisdictions," Prince William County Executive Craig S. Gerhart
> said.
> 
> Statistics the ICE provided to the Virginia State Crime Commission
> show that in fiscal 2007, law enforcement agencies in the state made
> 12,073 reports to the federal agency, which resulted in 694
> detainers.
> 
> "I think that comes to about 5 percent," said the commission's
> executive director, James O. Towey. "Some of those people may not
> have been illegal aliens. But this stat shows you they do not have
> the resources" to detain many of the immigrants they identify.
> 
> The effectiveness of the Virginia law will depend largely on ICE,
> Towey said. "Whether ICE comes and gets them and ultimately deports
> them is a matter that is beyond our control," he said.
> 
> Prince William Police Chief Charlie T. Deane is frustrated that ICE
> cannot tell him what has happened to the 800 suspected illegal
> immigrants his county has identified to the agency.
> 
> "We just want to know how the system works," he said. "We're
> spending resources to provide this information [to ICE], and we need
> to know what the results are."
> 
> Through various enforcement programs, ICE says it identified 164,296
> illegal immigrants who served time in local jails in fiscal 2007,
> including 2,738 in the District, Virginia, Maryland and Delaware.
> 
> ICE officials said recently that they had no data on how many were
> deported, how many were released from custody and given summonses to
> appear before immigration judges and, of those, how many failed to
> show for hearings and simply disappeared.
> 
> ICE spokesman Richard Rocha said gathering those statistics will
> require "manual tabulation" that will take "some time."
> 
> Recognizing the unpopularity of 287(g), the agency is preparing to
> roll out what it calls a "sweeping new plan," dubbed Secure
> Communities, that will give all local agencies direct access to a
> database that contains information collected by ICE and the
> Department of Justice.
> 
> However, the multibillion-dollar program has not been fully funded
> by Congress, and even if it is, ICE still might not have enough
> money to detain all of the illegal immigrants it identifies,
> Pendergraph said.
> 
> "You know something? We're playing catch-up," he said. "Five years
> ago, immigration enforcement for state and local law enforcement
> [agencies] wasn't even on the radar scope. We didn't get in this
> mess overnight. And we're not going to get out of it overnight."
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------
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