Can Criminals Hide in Church?

On the tradition of religious sanctuary.
By Daniel Engber

Posted Monday, Aug. 20, 2007, at 11:24 AM ET

Authorities arrested illegal immigrant and activist Elvira Arellano on Sunday, after she left the Chicago church where she had taken sanctuary for the past year. In an August 2006 Explainer, Daniel Engber wondered whether Arellano really could take legal refuge inside a church.

A Mexican immigrant-rights activist took sanctuary in a Chicago church on Wednesday rather than risk deportation and separation from her 7-year-old son. A government spokesman scoffed at the notion of church protection: "We will apprehend her at a time and place of our choosing," he said. Can a criminal find refuge inside a church?

Not according to the law.

Religious institutions in America don't have special permission to harbor criminals or protect them from the government. That hasn't stopped pastors from trying. In the 1980s, hundreds of churches joined together in the "sanctuary movement" to save Central American political refugees from deportation. They managed to offer some de facto protection, since the immigration authorities wanted to avoid the spectacle of church raids. But the courts ruled that church officials and volunteers weren't immune to criminal prosecution, and some members of the movement were convicted of transporting illegal aliens. (American churches made similar efforts on behalf of runaway slaves in the 19th century and Vietnam War protesters in the 1970s.)

http://www.slate.com/id/2172469/