Thread: Immigrants hope for deportation reprieves

Immigrants hope for deportation reprieves
Hundreds attend Pilsen forum on new federal review
chicagotribune.com
By Antonio Olivo and Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah, Tribune reporters
9:12 p.m. CDT, September 10, 2011


From left: Kimberly Marin, 12, stands with her sisters Talia, 17, and Denisse, 15, alongside their father Ramon Marin (center), whose order of deportation is under review, and U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (right) at a community forum on immigration Saturday.

After he was brought into the U.S. illegally as a 1-year-old, Luis Pedrote did so well in school that he won a President's Education Award in 2006.

Today, his family says, Pedrote, 19, sits in a Dallas detention facility after he was picked up last month by Chicago police who realized his illegal status while questioning him at his Gage Park home about a potential suspect.

"We just want our nephew back," said Pedrote's aunt, Elizabeth Manjarrez. "He's a good kid. He didn't do anything wrong."

Pedrote's case was highlighted at a community forum Saturday in Pilsen where hopeful families crowded into Benito Juarez High School to learn whether they could benefit from a federal review of 300,000 illegal immigration cases that could lead to a reprieve from deportation.

Department of Homeland Security officials announced last month that a federal working group will use what's known as prosecutorial discretion to determine more sympathetic cases and put the full focus on deporting hardened criminals. Those granted the reprieve would not be awarded legal status or authorization to work in the U.S., officials said.

At the top of the review list would be cases involving people brought into the U.S. illegally as children, followed by spouses of military personnel, pregnant women and those with serious illnesses, said Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., whose office spearheaded the Saturday event.

Gutierrez and other members of Congress were briefed on the procedure last week.

"Kids who've arrived here at a young age and, if you've kept your nose clean, you've gotten in no trouble with the law, they're going to close your case out," Gutierrez said.

About 300 people gathered in the school auditorium to listen to Gutierrez, ask questions and then fill out forms with the help of immigration advocacy groups. Gutierrez said his staff would then turn in forms of people eligible for the reprieve to DHS officials.

The review process was initiated amid a backlash by immigrant advocates against deportations under the Obama administration, which have approached 400,000 in the last two years.

A day before the federal review was announced, a group of activists staged an impromptu sit-in at a downtown Chicago intersection against the federal Secure Communities program, which targets hardened criminals in jail but has also netted illegal immigrants arrested for misdemeanors.

Last week, the Cook County Board approved an ordinance that directs the sheriff's office to refuse federal requests to detain suspected illegal immigrants who've been arrested on misdemeanor and felony charges but would otherwise be released.

Community forums like the one in Pilsen are being planned across the country to assemble good cases for potential review, said Josh Hoyt, director of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, which helped coordinate the Saturday event.

"People ought to know what's going on here," Hoyt said.

Many who attended the forum were hopeful despite some having already received a deportation date — a fact that one attorney cautioned may make it difficult to win a reprieve.

Ramon Marin, 41, came with his three daughters from Wisconsin. The girls, ranging in age from 12 to 17, were all born in the U.S. He's been in deportation proceedings since a traffic stop in 2003 when police discovered he did not have a driver's license or a Social Security number. The family has spent $18,000 fighting the deportation, which has been scheduled for Sept. 30.

In another case, Angelica Herrera, 34, of Crystal Lake, who is two months pregnant, could be separated from her husband and faces giving birth to the couple's first child in Mexico, away from family. Her deportation date has been set for Oct. 14.

"It's just been stressful," said her husband Tomislav Uremovic, 38, as others nearby filled out forms describing their family's heartache. "I don't want her to go."

aolivo@tribune.com

nahmed@tribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/educ ... 8869.story

This is a brazen disregard for federal law that should be brought before his fellow Congressional members.