Thread: Colo. "Samaritans" accused of transporting immigra

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_2850843

Article Launched: 07/11/2005 01:29:29 AM

briefs
Colo. "Samaritans" accused of transporting immigrants

Tucson - Two Colorado members of a border humanitarian group were arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol after an agent found three illegal immigrants in their vehicle.

The two No More Deaths volunteers, both students at Colorado College, were arrested at about noon Saturday, said Gustavo Soto, a spokesman for the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector. They were being held on charges of transporting illegal immigrants.

Soto said an agent pulled over a car marked as "Samaritan patrol" and found three illegal immigrants with students Daniel Strauss and Shanti Sellz, both 23.

Bill Walker, the volunteers' attorney, said they came across nine illegal immigrants in need of medical assistance and were able to treat six of them, but the other three needed more help.

One man was suffering from diarrhea and another had been vomiting for three days, Walker said.

"Our medical team called a registered nurse about the men's conditions and she verified that they needed to be seen by a doctor," Walker said. He said the volunteers were taking the men to Southside Presbyterian Church, where a doctor was to meet them.

Soto said a Border Patrol medical team examined the immigrants and found that they were OK.

"This is unbelievable," Walker said. "They are discouraging people from saving lives and helping others."

Border Patrol officials have said it is legal to give aid to immigrants who are distressed, but transporting them is illegal.

"This is unbelievable," Walker said. "They are discouraging people from saving lives and helping others."

If you are going to help criminals, you had better know the rules of the game. Or better yet, stay home where you belong if you are going to ignore the law.

This is so funny and at the same thing is so great!

Pro

Was Mr. Walker this upset when the Denver Police Officer was killed by an illegal alien?

Walker, if you were a Good Samaritan you would have driven them home to a hospital near them in Mexico.

Instead, you chose the "easy" way, the "illegal" way, by aiding and abetting illegal foreign nationals you know nothing about. You're lucky they didn't have enough energy to slit your throat and steal your car.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE? ARE THEY NUTS?

Let me ask a question: How many of these "do-gooders" go into Watts or Harlem and offer rides to a better life?

This is an example of hypocrisy at its highest idiot-level.

Can we pass a law that says when we find an idiot aiding and abetting this illegal traffic that we deport them too?

Here's what the Rocky Mtn New's said:

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/s ... 79,00.html

Two driving illegal immigrants arrested
By Tillie Fong, Rocky Mountain News
July 12, 2005

A Colorado College graduate and a Durango resident were arrested in Arizona after the U.S. Border Patrol found three illegal immigrants in their vehicle.

Daniel Strauss, 23, of Jackson Hole, Wyo., and Shanti Sellz, 23, of Durango, were arraigned Monday in federal court in Tucson and released. They were charged with transportation of illegal immigrants and obstruction of justice.

If convicted of the transportation- of-illegal-immigrants charge, they could each face up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Border patrol agents on Saturday arrested Strauss and Sellz, who had three illegal immigrants in their vehicle as they traveled east on Arivaca Road, two miles west of Amado, Ariz. Strauss and Sellz, volunteers with the humanitarian group No More Deaths, told the agents they were taking the people to a doctor.

According to a statement released Monday by Margo Cowlan, an attorney for No More Deaths, volunteers with the group found nine illegal immigrants wandering in the desert.

"Three of these persons reported vomiting (and) diarrhea, and one reported blood in his stool - all conditions which are symptomatic of extreme and life-threatening dehydration," Cowlan said.

Strauss and Sellz volunteered to drive the three to Tucson to be treated by a doctor, but were arrested en route, Cowlan said.

Gustavo Soto, a spokesman for Tucson Sector Border Patrol, said members of Border Search, Trauma and Rescue examined the three immigrants. "They were not in medical distress," Soto said. "All they needed was some water and rest."

Soto said the group could have contacted local authorities or border-patrol agents to tend to the three people's medical needs.

Eric Popkin, associate professor of sociology at Colorado College, worried about his former student Strauss. "He is a person with tremendous personal connections, someone who strongly believes in saving lives and trying to offer a hand to migrants in distress," said Popkin, who teaches a course on globalization and migration on the U.S.-Mexico border.

Popkin disagreed with Soto's advice on getting help for sick illegal immigrants: "Last summer, I encountered a migrant in distress and we called border patrol, but border patrol never came. Border patrol is called, but sometimes they respond and sometimes they do not."

Eric Popkin, associate professor of sociology at Colorado College, worried about his former student Strauss. "He is a person with tremendous personal connections, someone who strongly believes in saving lives and trying to offer a hand to migrants in distress," said Popkin, who teaches a course on globalization and migration on the U.S.-Mexico border.

Legal migrants are not in distress, you stupid twerp.

PINK-SLIP THE PROF..we don't need "courses" on globalization.

He's teaching "globalization and migration on the US Mexico Border" making money spreading Globbie Talk and sends his students down to Arizona to violate US Immigration Law!!

If his student "Strauss" with "tremendous personal connections" really believes in "saving lives" Strauss needs to use his personal connections to save the lives of Americans who are being killed daily all across the country by illegal aliens he's transporting in.

"Strauss" is a Foot Soldier for the Globbies tryin' to END OUR NATION which makes him what folks?

That's right...a Traitor!!

Lock him up; throw away the key; take whatever money he has that gives him those "tremendous personal connections"; feed him GMO mush until he begs for mercy and promises under oath and in front of American Witnessess NEVER TO PULL THAT CRAP AGAIN within the boundaries of the United States!!

Found a few more articles. I have a feeling eventually no charges will be filed on this one.



http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/ ... ase13.html

Judge frees volunteers arrested for taking aliens to medical care


The Associated Press
Jul. 12, 2005 10:12 AM

TUCSON- A federal magistrate has freed two members of a border humanitarian group who were arrested after federal agents found three illegal immigrants in their vehicle. The volunteers said they were carrying the three men to emergency medical care.

U.S. Magistrate Hector Estrada on Monday went against a federal prosecutor's recommendations to hold No More Deaths Coalition volunteers Shanti Sellz and Daniel Strauss. They are to return to court Wednesday for another hearing.

"They showed human compassion to those our government degrades as less than human," said Margo Cowan, a lawyer and spokeswoman for No More Deaths.

Sellz and Strauss, both 23, were arrested by Border Patrol agents Saturday.

The volunteers, who are among group members offering emergency aid to illegal immigrants in the desert this summer, came across a group of nine lost, wandering migrants. Sellz and Strauss gave them food and water and cared for their blisters.

The volunteers also called a nurse and doctor affiliated with No More Deaths about the heat-related symptoms of three men in the group. The nurse who took the call from Strauss, Helen Lundgren, said the volunteers told her the men had been drinking water from cattle tanks to survive in the hot desert. They were vomiting and had diarrhea and needed medical attention, she said.

What the Border Patrol described as transporting illegal immigrants, Cowan and the aid group described as medical evacuation.

"We have an absolute right to provide assistance," Cowan said. "It is our moral obligation."

Volunteers with the No More Deaths Coalition are camping in the desert near the border for a second consecutive summer to offer help. Dozens of illegal immigrants die in Arizona's rugged border region each year, often because of the heat.

Andrea Zortman, a Border Patrol spokeswoman, said agents checked the migrants, and determined they needed only water and a cool place to sit.

"If you feel someone is in dire straits, you need to call 911," she said. "You don't take it into your own hands."

Aid groups had been informed that giving food and water is legal, but "once they cross the line and put them in their vehicle, they're going to get arrested," Zortman said.

Two of three migrants the volunteers had in their marked "Samaritan Patrol" car at the time of the arrests have been returned to Mexico. Another is being held in federal custody as a material witness in the case against the volunteers.



http://www.kold.com/Global/story.asp?S= ... v=14RTc4X9

Arrested Humanitarians Speak Out

by Mark Poepsel, KOLD News-13 Reporter
posted 7/12/2005

Two volunteers with the border humanitarian group "No More Deaths" are speaking out after being arrested in what they call a medical evaucation.

"It's a huge injustice," says Daniel Strauss, a veteran volunteer who has spent the past summer and a half doing humanitarian work in Southern Arizona. "If the U. S. government has a policy of arresting people for saving lives, what kind of country do we live in?"

Strauss faces federal prison if convicted of transporting illegal immigrants and obstructing justice.

Fellow volunteer Shanti Sellz faces the same.

"The thing is, what's considered an emergency? Is it someone on their last breath or someone with severe blisters on their feet where if they stay in the desert another day they will be on their last breath," she says.

Both volunteers are taking the opportunity to make their political views known, although neither is talking about the specifics of the case as advised by their lawyer.

"Every year from the beginning of this border patrol policy has been the worst year yet," says Strauss, referring to a policy of tighter control in Texas and California leading to more illegal immigrants crossing in Arizona.

Andrea Zortman, spokesperson for the United States Border Patrol doesn't deny each year more illegal immigrants are dying in the desert.

"But on another note," she said, "Every year we're also rescuing more individuals than the year before."

She says Strauss and Sellz don't have to transport immigrants themselves.

"Transporting illegal aliens in furtherance away from the border is a crime, period. That's what we caught them doing. That's why they were arrested," Zortman said.

Sellz talked about the threat of becoming a convicted felon.

"The implications are scary, but I believe the outcome will be good for us. We have a lot of support, and we're doing the right thing," she said.

But the Border Patrol says the volunteers have options they have chosen not to use.

"They should've called 9-1-1 instead of taking it into their own hands. [The] 9-1-1 [service]can get there in a matter of seconds."

But Daniel Strauss says that's not what he's seen in the past.

"I have called Border Patrol for migrants dehydrated who wanted to return to Mexico, and it has taken hours for them to show up and take that individual," he says.

Zortman says the Border Patrol supports the rights of humanitarians to give aid, but Strauss and Sellz are finding out there's such a thing as going too far.

"Giving food and water in the desert is humanitarian. We completely understand that, but crossing the line and putting them in a vehicle is illegal," she says.

Strauss and Sellz have a hearing in federal court Wednesday morning.



http://kvoa.com/Global/story.asp?S=3586794&nav=HMO5c4wr


And it may be the heat that killed an illegal immigrant today.

The 27-year old man died near Yuma.

He was travelling with his brother when he collapsed, right after crossing-in from Mexico.

The brother was taken into custody by the border patrol.

Shanti Sellz and Daniel Strauss say they showed compassion to people in need, and if they had to do it over and get arrested for helping people....they would..

Strauss says, "A human life is extremely valuable. I would go thru anything to save a life."

Selz says, "I don't feel any of my actions are illegal so I'm not ever questioning my getting arrested or not i'm just doing the work."

The work....consists of giving food, water and medical attention to illegal immigrants who are crossing the desert.

And to prevent people from dying.

Their atty. Bill Walker wouldn't allow them to answer questions relating to case. He maintains they were not breaking the law. He says the three immigrants were in desperate need of medical attention.

"Congress didn't say it was illegal to transport...congress said it was illegal to transport for illegal purposes not illegal to transport a person that is in dire medical need."

Border Patrol officials say the illegal immigrants were not in dire medical need.

Border agents say they had warned the no more deaths coalition that once they put illegals in their vehicle they were breaking federal law and would be arrested.

Two of the illegal border crossers have already been sent back. One remains to testify against the two volunteers.

Give the migrants some water and drive them home to Mexico just like the Legal Process in America would do.

Veeeery simple.

Problem Solved.

EVERY TRAFFICKER could say, "They are thirty and I'm driving them to the hospital."

Right!?

Transporting immigrants? I'm so sick of this revisionism crap. Why can't the media call a spade a spade? They are illegal aliens. Not immigrants. The media makes it sound like it was a crime to round up the criminals in the first place.