Thread: Do Illegal Aliens Make Crime Rates Rise? Depends Whom You As

Do Illegal Aliens Make Crime Rates Rise? Depends Whom You Ask

Tuesday, Mar 04, 2008 - 12:09 AM Updated: 07:48 AM
By A. BARTON HINKLE
TIMES-DISPATCH COLUMNIST

The beginning of wisdom," says a character in Raymond Chandler's Farewell, My Lovely, "is the asking of many questions." But if you're asking about immigration, good luck trying to find clear-cut answers.

The other day a West Coast think tank announced the results of a study on immigration and crime. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, individuals born outside the U.S. are significantly less likely than American-born citizens to wind up in a California prison. People born outside the U.S. constitute 35 percent of California's population -- but only 17 percent of its prison and jail population.

The disparity is even bigger in some demographic sectors. U.S.-born adult men "are incarcerated in state prisons at rates up to 3.3 times higher than foreign-born men," the PPIC says. "Among men ages 18-40 -- the age group most likely to commit crime -- those born in the United States are 10 times more likely than immigrants to be in county jail or state prison."

Those numbers don't distinguish between legal immigrants and illegal aliens, so it might be that illegal aliens make up a disproportionate number of incarcerated foreign-born persons. But that also might not be the case, because "noncitizen men from Mexico ages 18-40 -- a group disproportionately likely to have entered the United States illegally -- are more than eight times less likely than U.S.-born men in the same age group to be in a correctional setting (0.48 percent vs. 4.2 percent)."

Let's pause here to stipulate that none of this makes illegal border-crossing OK. Illegal immigration is still wrong -- and those who are caught still should be sent home and made to go to the back of the immigration line.

BUT THE news does mean one of the main arguments used by illegal-immigration hawks -- that illegal aliens cause crime rates to rise -- might be false. Why? Because even if you assume for the sake of argument that every single crime committed by a foreign-born resident of California was committed by an illegal alien, illegal aliens in Cali fornia still commit crime at a rate lower than that of native U.S. citizens.

In fact, if the California study holds up, then the argument that illegal aliens cause crime rates to go up is not only false -- it is backward. If illegal aliens commit less crime than native citizens, then they are bringing the crime rate down.

But does the study hold up? Not necessarily.

For one thing, it might be that illegal aliens seek victims mostly within their own population, and the victims might be less inclined to report crimes to the authorities. Since unreported crimes are almost impossible to prove by definition, there's no use lingering over the point.

So consider other studies from other sources. The North Carolina Sheriff's Association recently reported that 11 percent of county jail inmates in that state are foreign-born. By contrast, only 7 percent of state residents were born outside the U.S. In the metro areas, such as Charlotte and Raleigh, the difference is even more pronounced: One in five inmates is foreign-born. (No word on the number of those who are illegal aliens.)

WHAT ABOUT Virginia?

In January the State Crime Commission's illegal-immigration task force released its final report. It says: "The total number of individuals in a Virginia jail at some point during FY2007 was 215,769. Of this number, 6 percent (13,735 of 215,769) were determined to be . . . illegal."

The report doesn't say what percentage of inmates are foreign-born. But the Census Bureau says 10 percent of Virginia's overall population is foreign-born. And Qian Cai, director of the Weldon Cooper Center's demographics and workforce section at the University of Virginia, says a rough -- very rough -- estimate figures that 3 percent of state residents are illegal aliens.

That makes it look as though illegal aliens commit a disproportionate number of crimes. But hold on one more sec.

In Virginia prisons, illegal aliens amount to only 1.5 percent of the incarcerated population. Which means illegal aliens are committing fewer -- not more -- serious offenses. The higher percentage in jails frequently reflects their undocumented status. In other words: An illegal alien who gets pulled over for a busted taillight might go to jail because he has no driver's license -- not because he's wanted for armed robbery. (Deportation? Immigration hawks themselves dismiss that factor as vanishingly insignificant.)

The stats draw a complex picture that makes it hard for impartial Virginians to reach hard-and-fast conclusions. That won't stop the activists on either side -- who are sure to cherry-pick the numbers they like and dismiss the numbers they don't. When it comes to immigration, far too many abide by the motto, "Don't confuse me with the facts."

My thoughts do not aim for your assent -- just place them alongside your own reflections for a while.

--Robert Nozick.
Contact A. Barton Hinkle at (804) 649-6627 or bhinkle@timesdispatch.com.

http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/opinion/o ... -0017.html

Flawed Studies Ignore Real Impact Of Illegal Immigration


By Senator Dennis Hollingsworth (R-Murrieta), Senator Mark Wyland (R-Carlsbad), Assemblyman Martin Garrick (R-Carlsbad), Assemblyman Kevin Jefferies (R-Lake Elsinore), and Assemblyman George Plescia (R-San Diego)

Recently, two lengthy immigration studies were released that made headlines across California for their unbelievable claims made by the authors on the impact of illegal immigration in our state.

These so-called immigration experts at the Public Policy Institute of California and the Immigration Policy Center came to the misguided conclusion that illegal immigrants living in California actually help American workers earn higher wages, and break fewer laws than other demographic groups in our state.

When asked about his conclusions, the co-author of one of the reports, Ruben Rumbaut, told a newspaper that he hoped his work would “reduce prejudice.â€