http://www.chronline.com/Main.asp?Secti ... leID=26021

Friday, December 23, 2005

East county crash raises questions on illegal alien policies

The accident Monday morning on U.S. Highway 12 near Randle raises some troubling questions again about illegal aliens in this country and how that issue is being dealt with by our government at all levels.

The crash killed one person and injured several others when the van in which they were riding went out of control.

Rene Ramirez-Perez, 20, of Shelton was the driver. A Washington State Patrol investigation has indicated the van was being driven over the speed limit and attempted to pass a tractor-trailer rig in a no-passing zone. The van went out of control, veered into the ditch, landed on its top in the roadway and was struck by the tractor-trailer rig.

Ramirez-Perez was arrested and has been charged with one count of vehicular homicide, three counts of vehicular assault, and hit and run.

Lewis County Prosecutor Jeremy Randolph reports that Ramirez-Perez, a citizen of Guatemala, is in this country illegally. He was deported from this country back to Guatemala in 2003.

Yet at the time of the accident Monday, Ramirez-Perez had a Washington state driver’s license.

Ramirez-Perez is now in the United States illegally for at least the second time. So much for the deportation. So much for border security, surveillance and detention. So much for identifying, apprehending, holding and deporting illegal aliens after they enter the United States.

And how was Ramirez-Perez able to get a driver’s license in this state, when he was an illegal alien? Presumably he got it since 2003, when he would have been just 18 or younger.

There is another troubling aspect of illegal aliens having driver’s licenses, at least in this state. People of voting age who apply for drivers’ licenses in Washington are offered the chance to register to vote under the federal motor-voter law.

How many illegal aliens are there in this state and elsewhere across the country who have illegal driver’s licenses and have used them to register to vote â€â€