Thread: L.A. police immigrant policy faces another test

L.A. police immigrant policy faces another test
A group of city residents is preparing a challenge to the longtime LAPD policy that prohibits officers from inquiring about suspects' status.
By Patrick McGreevy and Richard Winton, Times Staff Writers
April 11, 2007

The Los Angeles Police Department's landmark Special Order 40, which prohibits officers from inquiring about the immigration status of suspects, has come under an aggressive assault by anti-illegal immigrant activists who argue that it ties the hands of police.

The nearly 30-year-old policy has long been controversial, but the current national debate about illegal immigration has prompted lawsuits that are aimed at overturning Special Order 40 and similar rules across the country.

Los Angeles was the first major city to enact the "don't ask, don't tell" policy on illegal immigration, though most other police agencies have followed suit. So the outcome of the legal challenges could have a widespread effect.

The latest challenge would come this week, with a lawsuit that would ask a judge to require that the LAPD inform federal immigration officials when illegal immigrants are arrested on drug charges.

The suit, which is endorsed by the Federal Immigration Reform Enforcement Coalition and is scheduled to be filed as early as today, cites an obscure state code that appears to require local police to report to federal authorities the names of any illegal immigrant arrested on suspicion of drug trafficking or possession.

The city is already gearing up for a trial over a Special Order 40 challenge that has been filed by another anti-illegal immigration group, the Washington, D.C.-based Judicial Watch. That group argues that the order is unconstitutional.

In both cases, plaintiffs said, they are supported by rank-and-file police officers who don't like the policy but are afraid to speak out publicly because Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Police Chief William J. Bratton are vocal proponents of it.

Some officers are calling on the Los Angeles police union board of directors to consider, for the first time, taking a formal position on Special Order 40. The board plans to discuss the issue soon.

"We have heard there is concern among the members," said Bob Baker, president of the Police Protective League, on Tuesday.

Some legal experts said Tuesday that they were intrigued by the anti-illegal immigrant forces' use of a section of the state's Health and Safety Code to attack Special Order 40.

The section, which was written in 1972, states that in drug possession and trafficking cases involving a noncitizen, "the arresting agency shall notify the appropriate agency of the United States having charge of deportation."

"This is going to be an interesting issue," said Gerald F. Uelman, a law professor at Santa Clara University.

Uelman said that although the challenge was novel, Los Angeles officials could argue that questioning the immigration status only of drug offenders violates the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause.

"What is the rational basis for choosing drug offenses over violent crimes?" Uelmen said.

Politically, Special Order 40 remains very popular at L.A. City Hall — with supporters saying that it ensures that the members of the city's many immigrant communities will cooperate with police without fear of deportation.

Villaraigosa repeated his strong support for the policy Tuesday.

"I agree with Chief Bratton and every police chief before him that requiring our police officers to double as immigration agents will result in fewer arrests, prosecutions and convictions," he said.

But the policy — and similar ones elsewhere in the United States — have become the focus of debates in the blogosphere and on cable news shows and talk radio.

Last week, television and radio commentator Bill O'Reilly criticized Bratton for refusing to enforce the law against illegal immigrants.

The debate comes as cities debate how to deal with illegal immigrants. Some cities, such as Maywood, which is southeast of downtown Los Angeles, have dubbed themselves "sanctuary cities" that attempt to treat illegal immigrants like citizens.


But elsewhere — including in Orange County — some law enforcement officials have forged stronger ties with federal immigration officials. Orange County sheriff's deputies and Costa Mesa police officers receive training from immigration officials.

In Arizona, voters decided to deny bail to illegal immigrants who had been arrested on charges involving serious felonies. And Maricopa County deputies, some Phoenix police officers and state public safety police have been trained to enforce immigration laws.

Southern California immigrant-rights activists bristle at the thought that many Special Order 40 opponents, though living outside Los Angeles, seek to dictate how the city treats its immigrants. They are concerned that other cities are moving away from similar protective orders.

"It's a very slippery slope," said Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigration Rights of Los Angeles. "We have always known with the LAPD there is disagreement on the issue. The leadership supports Special Order [40] but a minority of officers, a very vocal minority, want to enforce immigration laws and they want to expand their ability to do that."

Some LAPD officers privately support the latest lawsuit, said Dave Klehm, the Santa Ana attorney who drafted the litigation pro bono on behalf of a group of Los Angeles residents.

"One of the reasons I'm doing this is to help out police officers so they don't have to put their lives on the line repeatedly re-arresting drug offenders who should have been deported the first time," Klehm said Tuesday.

One veteran LAPD officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of fear of punishment, said Tuesday that he had talked to Klehm and other backers of the lawsuit and thought that the suit was a good idea.

"We are having a revolving door out there in terms of people we arrest for drug offenses who are in this country illegally," the officer said.

A second LAPD officer, who is part of the command staff, also voiced support for the litigation, saying that the department for decades has not reported the thousands of illegal immigrants arrested on drug charges to federal authorities.

The command officer said that many officers who don't like the current policy would support a change. Under the rules, the immigration status of most arrestees is checked by federal agents and county jail workers only after they have been convicted of a crime and are in jail.

The lawsuit cites a study by the U.S. Government Accountability Office in 2005. The GAO study, which involved 55,322 illegal immigrants incarcerated in federal, state and local facilities during 2003, found that they had been arrested an average of eight times each, and that 49% previously had been convicted of a felony, while 20% had been arrested for a drug offense. Many also had been convicted of violent crimes.

As a result, the lawsuit argues that if the LAPD complied with state law, "petitioners would have a much lower chance of being victims of a violent crime committed by an illegal alien who was previously arrested for any one of the 14 listed drug offenses."

One of the plaintiffs, 50-year-old machinist Rudy Moreno of El Sereno, said the repeal of Special Order 40 would help his neighborhood and the officers who work in it. "The police seem to have to keep re-arresting the same criminals over and over again," he said.

A survey of the Los Angeles County jail system earlier this year estimated that about 20% of the inmates were illegal immigrants.

The potential lawsuit comes less than a year after Judicial Watch sued the LAPD.

That suit alleges that Special Order 40 violates state and federal law by prohibiting the maximum amount of cooperation between the Police Department and immigration authorities in enforcing immigration laws.

"It handcuffs police officers' ability to ensure law and order in the city," said Sterling "Ernie" Norris, an attorney for Judicial Watch. "It is a model for sanctuary cities. It is the original. Los Angeles is where it all began."

Norris said the problem was illustrated by last week's auto accident in which an illegal immigrant, who had been arrested before, was allegedly driving drunk when his truck struck a car, killing film director Bob Clark and Clark's son Ariel.

"If he wasn't here, he couldn't have committed the crime," Norris said. "If law enforcement had been able to do their duty, it would have saved those lives."

But ACLU staff attorney Belinda Helzer said Special Order 40 allows people in the United States illegally to feel comfortable in approaching the police to report crimes.

Repealing it, she said, "would exacerbate the fear of victims" of crime "who are undocumented and are already living in the shadows."

*

patrick.mcgreevy@latimes.com

richard.winton@latimes.com

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LAPD's Special Order 40
Should officers be allowed to inquire about individuals' immigration status?
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me ... -headlines

Villaraigosa repeated his strong support for the policy Tuesday.

This major racist pip-squeak is a significant reason as to why Los Angeles is sliding down into the sewer.

Special Order 40 has to be reversed as it is bias and a possible danger to police, bail bonds personel and citizens. When an illegal is arrested you don't know their true identity as many use fake ID or aliases. If they have not been previously arrested then their finger prints aren't on file and if they have you can only tell if they are using an alias for the second or third offense. There is no information what if any criminal acts they have been arrested for or have warrants for back in their homeland. This is where the danger part fits in. You have no history on them.
If a legal or an illegal gets arrested in one state for a minor offense and does not show up to court and goes to another state even though a bench warrant may be out on them and show up on NCIC system, the original state will not have them extradited as it is only a minor offense and too costly under those circumstances to bother with. This also poses a problem as most Americans won't run from a bench warrant for a minor offense but illegals on the other hand are used to using others ID and have no problems running in many cases. If they got one fake ID then they already know where to find another and then they have the option of running back home.

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There are now up to 44 comments left after this article.

Man, those people in LA just don't get it do they, well it looks like some of them are finally getting it. Wonder how much of LA county speaks English today. The taxpayers there will be paying for English classes next.
You need to overturn special order 40 and start enforcing your immigration laws and you can not do that and be sucessful with out the help of local police.

Here is the comment I posted on the LA Times website which follows the article:

6. Of course Special Order 40 should be repealed. If it wasn't for pussy footing, politically correct, vote pandering politicians it would have been gone long ago. I have watched LA go down the tubes for 40 years and I just hope it's not too late to salvage.

Submitted by: P.J.Roach
12:00 PM PDT, April 11, 2007

This is great! There are now 82 comments to this article. Special Order 40 is a role model for Santuary City policies. Let's see it go down! Let the LA Times know what you think guys! I posted mine when I initially posted this story.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me ... 9&limit=10

Originally Posted by cvangel

This is great! There are now 82 comments to this article. Special Order 40 is a role model for Santuary City policies. Let's see it go down! Let the LA Times know what you think guys! I posted mine when I initially posted this story.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me ... 9&limit=10

Don't look now but California may be going in the other direction.

Originally Posted by KSBW TV 8 Salinas

Santa Cruz Leaders Opt Not To Help Immigration Officials
Officials Disagree With Federal Agents' Tactics
April 10, 2007

Santa Cruz city leaders said no to the federal government and no to illegal immigration enforcement in a landmark decision Tuesday. Officials said the decision was unprecedented in the immigration debate -- a local municipality refusing to help with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Santa Cruz city leaders unanimously approved a plan to prohibit using city funds or resources to assist ICE enforcement in Santa Cruz. The policy comes as a response to countywide raids that happened last year. The operation, dubbed "Return to Sender," corraled 107 people who were arrested and deported.

The nationwide effort to reduce illegal immigration was designed to target only immigrants who already have deportation orders from a judge, but agents of ICE picked up other undocumented immigrations they came across, too. City councilman Tony Madrigal said he wants to keep local police from helping federal agents arrest illegal immigrants. ICE spokeswoman Virginia Kice said the agency recognizes the differences in enforcement between local police and federal agents and is respectful of that. But she added that those arrested last September were among a group of criminal aliens and foreign nationals who had been served deportation orders and failed to follow them. Santa Cruz police said they have not participated in any immigration and customs raids and do not plan to in the future. Source

Another sanctuary city. Soon, they'll be bandito hideouts 'cuz most little towns are worried they'll become magnets without anti-illegal-alien ordinances. California's becoming foreigner and foreigner, or was that Mexicaner.