Immigration debate flares on the Vineyard
By Patrick Cassidy
STAFF WRITER
February 17, 2008

OAK BLUFFS — She was speeding and from Vineyard Haven. He was driving without a license and originally came from Brazil.

When 20-year-old Brandy Gibson's 1993 Oldsmobile hit a delivery van driven by Francellyo Dias Jan. 29, the impact pushed both vehicles 50 feet.

The accident also propelled Martha's Vineyard residents into the heart of the national debate on illegal immigration.

When islanders learned that Gibson had died in the crash, local newspapers and online forums were flooded with calls for the deportation of illegal immigrants and more stringent punishments for driving without a license.

State police last week released preliminary accident reconstruction findings that indicate Gibson was traveling at 82 mph as she approached the intersection where the accident occurred. When she struck the van driven by Dias, she was in the middle of a skid and had slowed to 73 mph, police said.

The speed limit on that section of roadway is 35 mph.

Dias was turning into the roadway and driving 9 mph, police said. He and a passenger in the van were taken to a Boston hospital but have since been released.

But even after new information came to light, many online comments focused on Dias, blaming him for the accident and expressing anger that he was an illegal immigrant.

Similar comments made their way into island online forums.

"Is it the same undercurrent that's always on the Vineyard?" Oak Bluffs Police Chief Erik Blake asked rhetorically in an interview last week. "That's my personal opinion."

The undercurrent became a wave after Gibson's death. From ugly looks exchanged at the post office to anonymous online posts seething with frustration over a failure to fix the nation's immigration policy, emotions have festered like a wound.

"There has been a lot of retaliation, a lot of comments," said Leo DeOliveira, a West Tisbury police officer and a native of Brazil.

Population figures for Brazilians on the island are difficult to pinpoint. Estimates by local health and law enforcement officials range from 2,500 to 5,000. Those numbers may have dropped off in the past six months as economic conditions and immigration enforcement have pushed Brazilians to leave.

There are immigrants from other countries too, but Brazilians represent the largest group — totaling between 16 and 32 percent of the island's year-round population of 15,500 residents.

Most come to fill landscaping, construction and housekeeping jobs. About half are probably here illegally, said DeOliveira.

License law under review
Dias was driving a delivery van for Humphreys Inc., a company that operates a series of delicatessens across the island. The owners of that business have been cited for allowing an unlicensed operator to drive a company vehicle.

And whether a driver is Brazilian or born in the United States, here legally or illegally, traffic law is the law, said Blake and DeOliveira.

"It doesn't matter if you are white, black or what," DeOliveira said. "The issue is bigger than that."

So is the debate over immigration.

"When something like this happens it sparks a lot of anger," DeOliveira said.

The anger in this case has also been directed toward the court system. Dias was cited for driving without a license in 2006 but the maximum possible fine for the violation is $200, even for repeat offenders. Because the penalty is legislated neither the court nor prosecutors have much say in the matter, DeOliveira said.

There is legislation in committee on Beacon Hill that, if passed, would increase the penalties for driving without a license, state Sen. Robert O'Leary, D-Barnstable, said in a telephone interview Friday.

The bill, Senate No. 2108, was sponsored by Sen. Richard Tisei, R-Wakefield. The proposed law would increase the fine for driving without a license to between $500 and $1,000 for the first offense and up to 10 days in jail. For second and subsequent offenses, the fine would jump to between $1,000 and $2,000 with a possible jail term of up to 30 days.

"Unfortunately it's an incident like this that gets attention to a bill," O'Leary said.

Since Gibson's death, Vineyard residents say they have noticed a drop-off in traffic and some Brazilians say they are no longer driving. It was hard to go far on the island last week without passing a police cruiser.

"Scared of persecution"
"Most of the people stay in their homes because they are scared of the persecution," said Monica Ticionel, a 25-year-old waitress at Tropical Bakery in Vineyard Haven.

As the buffet-style restaurant filled for lunch last Tuesday, Ticionel talked about why she came to the United States. "It's not easy my life here because I have a one daughter in Brazil who is 6 years old," she said. "When I came here it was just for the money."

Ticionel said she is working legally but does not have a driver's license. She sends $1,000 to $1,500 back to Brazil each month, pays about $600 for rent and spends another $400 on food and clothes, she said. Since arriving on the island she has grown to like the people, the music and the culture, she said.

Getting around without a license is difficult though, and the police, especially in Oak Bluffs, are strict, she said.

Blake and Oak Bluffs police Lt. Timothy Williamson do not disagree.

"We're a fairly proactive department," Williamson said. "We're not going to apologize for doing our job."

But Blake's department is careful to avoid profiling, he said, and he has reached out to the Brazilian community in several ways.

When it became apparent that illegal immigrants were hesitant to report crimes to the police for fear of being deported, Blake and others spoke to leaders at local churches, important centers for the island's Brazilians.

The Oak Bluffs police created a 14-page pamphlet with a Portuguese translation about the police and the law. Outreach like that has helped curtail arrests, Blake said.

In Oak Bluffs, arrests or summons for driving without a license dropped 42 percent from 142 in 2006 to 77 in 2007, Williamson said.

Another part of the pamphlet outlines how local police are not authorized to enforce immigration law.

"I got too much to do," Blake said about the possibility of an agreement with federal immigration officials to make this possible. There are three agreements between local law enforcement and federal immigration officials in Massachusetts, including one with the Barnstable County Sheriff's Office.

When U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement come to the island, local officials are obligated to assist but that is as far as it goes, Blake said. "I hate operating in a vacuum but we have to look out for Oak Bluffs."

And residents of Oak Bluffs are clearly looking out for each other. At North Star, a popular Brazilian market in Edgartown, a box for donations to help the Gibson family with funeral arrangements sat on the counter last week.

"I feel sorry for the family because she is very young," said Lena Queiroga, 28, an employee at the store. "It doesn't matter if it is American or Brazilian."

As it turns out, Gibson had family who were Brazilian. Queiroga said she saw the young woman at a Brazilian church two months ago.

And Brazilians have not stopped coming to the island for work.

On a ferry ride from Woods Hole to Vineyard Haven last week, a group of young men from Framingham chatted in Portuguese.

They were headed to the island for a week's worth of construction work, said 22-year-old Leandro DePaulo.

DePaulo, who came from Brazil five years ago, said he had a Massachusetts driver's license. He heard about Gibson's death on the news. Accidents will happen no matter what, he said.

A few seats away an Edgartown resident who would only give his name as Jim said he admired anyone who would leave their native country so long as they came to work here legally.

His own family came from Ireland in the 1930s, he said, and he said he appreciates how hard immigrants work. But, "illegal is illegal," he said.

Patrick Cassidy can be reached at pcassidy@capecodonline.com.
http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs. ... /802170349