Thread: NC:Wake County Begins National ICE Pilot Program Today

Published: Nov. 12, 2008 12:30 AM
Modified: Nov. 12, 2008 09:01 AM

Wake jail widens immigration checks

In a pilot program beginning today, everyone booked will be checked against a fingerprint database.

SARAH OVASKA, Staff Writer

RALEIGH - Now everyone booked into the Wake County jail will have their immigration history and citizenship checked.

Wake County jailers will have access to a fingerprint-based database that includes data about visa applications, previous deportations and residency applications -- part of a pilot program starting today by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The purpose, says Wake Sheriff Donnie Harrison, is to find out whether someone arrested is in the country illegally. Fingerprint records will be used in addition to the resources the sheriff's detention officers already have to check inmates' immigration status. The Wake Sheriff's Office participates in the 287(g) program, named for a section of a federal law that allows local jailers to check the immigration status of inmates and begin deportation proceedings.

Only seven agencies in the country were selected for the pilot program, including jails in Wake, Gaston, Henderson and Buncombe counties. The other three are in jails in Boston, Houston and Dallas.

"The goal is to have a virtual ICE presence in every jail in the country," said Julie Myers, ICE's assistant secretary.

With a new presidential administration coming to Washington in January, Myers said she didn't know how, or if, plans to expand the program would be affected.

"I'm very hopeful that the new administration will see this program as a priority," Myers said.

Congress has designated $350 million for the program. Eventually, that cost is expected to rise to up to $3 billion a year nationwide and flag for deportation an estimated 300,000 to 450,000 people arrested on criminal charges each year, according to ICE figures.

But the expanded searches, done at the same time a person's criminal history is checked, are also being viewed warily by Latino advocacy and civil liberties groups. They cite instances in which illegal immigrants have faced deportation proceedings after arrests for traffic violations. The fingerprint checks mean that more of a person's personal information will be shared with law enforcement, said Rebecca Headen of the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina.

"We're once again seeing criminal enforcement allied with immigration enforcement," Headen said. "They're two totally separate systems in our country."

Harrison cautioned that the database wouldn't be used by deputies patrolling the county. He hopes the access to more of the immigration records will take some of the guesswork out of detention officers' work. Jailers now have to rely on a person's admission that they're foreign-born before questioning them more.

"Even though they say that they might be born here, they'll still be checked," Harrison said. "We won't have anybody slipping through the cracks."

North Carolina has been a leading state in ICE's partnerships with local law enforcement with seven sheriff's offices and the Durham Police Department participating in the program. ICE officials estimate 4,000 people in North Carolina have been flagged for deportation since 2006.

sarah.ovaska@newsobserver.com or 919-829-4622

htttp://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1291253.html

Wooo hooo! NOW ICE will begin to see just how many illegals there really are in this State! I'll keep my fingers crossed that they will begin to wonder... if there are so many how are they supporting themselves? Let the raids begin in earnest here in NC!!!

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