Immigrant exonerated in fatal crash remains in jail

By Rich Cholodofsky
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Various jail cells have held Sam Thompson since February.

He's also been living as an illegal immigrant for nearly a decade and has become one of a growing number of people who have clogged Pennsylvania courts awaiting word on whether they can stay in this country.

Thompson's illegal status finally came to the attention of immigration officials on Feb. 8, when he was charged with vehicular homicide after his tractor-trailer crashed into the back of a car on the Pennsylvania Turnpike near Irwin, killing a passenger in the car.

Then 32-year-old Thompson, a Maryland-based truck driver, spent six months in Westmoreland County Prison before he was acquitted of the criminal charge.

But he is still behind bars until immigration officials decide whether he will return to his native Ghana or whether he will remain in the United States.

After Thompson's acquittal by a Westmoreland County jury in August, he was taken into custody by the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service and shipped to three different jails around the state.

Now Thompson is being held in York County Prison awaiting an Oct. 1 hearing when he will ask for bail while he awaits his deportation hearing.

When a deportation hearing will take place is anyone's guess.

"We don't know when it will be scheduled," said Thompson's lawyer, John Smarto of Jeannette.

Thompson is among more than 400 people who await a hearing at a special federal court in York County that handled more than 3,000 cases last year involving illegal immigrants.

Immigration cases from western and central Pennsylvania have risen during the past several years.

The York court handled 2,585 cases in 2005. That number jumped to nearly 3,300 last year. As of Aug. 31, it has received 3,327 new cases and disposed of nearly 3,200 older cases.

Pennsylvania's other immigration court in Philadelphia has seen its caseload increase by about 200 so far this year, but it also has 2,700 pending cases, according to Susan Eastwood, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security, which operates the immigration courts. The court handled 4,324 cases in 2006.

"There's no real definite time it takes to get a case through the court. It's all dependent on the case," Eastwood said.

The courts field bond hearings, deportation hearings and requests for asylum, among other administrative issues involving immigration. INS previously initiated immigration cases now being handled by homeland security, which oversees immigration and naturalization.

Critics of the government's immigration policy point to the heavy caseload of the courts and suggest that new laws are needed to weed out the illegal aliens.

Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the Washington-based Federation for American Immigration Reform, said laws must be changed to prevent illegal immigrants such as Thompson from being allowed to stay in the country.

"We need laws that make it impossible for people like that from staying, a system that prevents his getting a job and makes it more difficult to work or rent an apartment. Then you would avoid these kinds of situations," Mehlman said.

Thompson entered the country legally on a one-month visitor's visa in 1997, Smarto said. But Thompson took no action to renew the visa or seek permanent legal status for the next four years.

In the intervening years, Thompson married a U.S. citizen and fathered two children. Smarto said Thompson tried to adjust his status in 2001, the same year he took a job with a Maryland company as a truck driver, but a paperwork error on his application caused immigration officials to deny his request.

His Maryland attorney erroneously checked a box on the visa application suggesting that Thompson had sneaked into the country in 1997, Smarto said.

Thompson made no further efforts to adjust his status until October 2006, when he again was denied a visa.

"It appears (the process) is pretty harsh on him," Smarto said. "But he has some blame here, too."

Thompson first came to the attention of immigration officials after his arrest in February. Thompson was charged with vehicular homicide when his 30-ton tractor-trailer slammed into the rear of a car carrying Honduran diplomat Nuria Ortiz Navarro, who was in the back seat.

Ortiz Navarro was killed in the crash. Thompson claimed her car, driven by her Chilean husband, had crossed over into traffic, causing the collision.

Thompson was arrested, and police ran a routine background check that disclosed his status as an illegal immigrant. An INS detainer was filed against him, meaning that when Thompson was let out of jail in connection with the vehicular homicide case he would be taken into federal custody.

Thompson's acquittal on the criminal charge in August resulted in his release from the Westmoreland County Prison.

Next week, he will seek to return to his adopted home in Maryland, which he shares with his American wife and his children, ages 3 and 5. "He's been trying to do the right thing. He's been documented, and he hasn't been hiding," Smarto said.

But Mehlman said Thompson's case should be an example to other immigrants who look to stay in the country illegally.

"He consciously violated the terms of his admission. This isn't any different than someone who entered the country illegally," Mehlman said. "We have to have a system in place that prevents someone from benefiting from violating the law."

Rich Cholodofsky can be reached at rcholodofsky@tribweb.com or 724-837-0240.

http://pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburght ... 29198.html