Thread: New federal database is helping to identify migrant felons

New federal database is helping to identify migrant felons

by Erin Kelly - Jun. 25, 2010 12:00 AM
Republic Washington Bureau
.

WASHINGTON - A federal database designed to identify non-citizens has helped authorities remove 31,000 convicted criminals from the United States in less than two years and is being aggressively expanded throughout Arizona and the nation by President Barack Obama's administration.

The Secure Communities database already is in use at jails in seven Arizona counties: Cochise, Maricopa, Pima, Pinal, Santa Cruz, Yavapai and Yuma.


Local police agencies say the database uses fingerprint matches to help them determine who they have in custody. The database, which contains information gathered by the Homeland Security Department, can tell police whether a person under arrest has been deported from the United States before. It also can help them determine whether a person is wanted for serious crimes in another country.

"This is another tool to help us get criminals off the streets to protect your family and mine," said Lt. Michael Lindsay of the Harris County Sheriff's Office in Houston, which is one of nearly 400 agencies participating in the program.

From August 2008 to September 2009, the Secure Communities database helped Harris County deputies identify about 6,000 criminal illegal immigrants, including a man wanted by Interpol for gruesome killings in Mexico and gang members wanted for murder in South Carolina, Lindsay said.

Because the database helps local authorities determine immigration status, it is often confused with the controversial 287(g) program, which gives local law-enforcement agencies the power to enforce federal immigration laws. But participation in the Secure Communities program offers only access to information, not additional enforcement powers.

Still, critics say, the system could become an incentive for some local police agencies to arrest immigrants on minor offenses simply to run them through the Immigration and Customs Enforcement database to see if they are in the country illegally and try to have them deported. The result, they say, could be racial profiling in which Latinos and other minority groups are targeted.

"At first blush, this does seem like a generic computer program that is just about transmitting information," said Brittney Nystrom, director of policy and legal affairs for the National Immigration Forum, an immigrant-rights group. "But once you understand that it's dependent on who is being hauled into the police station in the first place, that raises serious questions for a lot of people."


Initiative's results

The Secure Communities Initiative, which seeks to find and remove non-citizens convicted of crimes ranging from extortion to murder, began in October 2008 in the final months of President George W. Bush's tenure, and it has been picked up and aggressively deployed by the Obama administration.

In the past month alone, ICE has boosted the number of local law-enforcement agencies using the database from 197 in 20 states to 390 in 23 states. The agency's plan is to have the system in place nationwide at 3,100 jails by the end of 2013.

From late October 2008 through early May, about 240,000 criminal aliens have been identified through the Secure Communities database, said Richard Rocha, ICE deputy press secretary.

Among them: a man arrested in Phoenix last year for a minor crime and released on bail. When the database identified him as a violent member of the Los Compitas Mesa gang who had previously been deported after serving time in an Arizona prison for aggravated assault and other crimes, he was taken back into custody within hours. Without the database, he would have remained on the streets of Phoenix, ICE officials told Congress.

Of the criminals identified by the database, nearly 31,000 have been deported or removed from the United States, Rocha said. The rest are awaiting trial, still serving time in U.S. jails, or unable to be deported because they have become naturalized citizens or they are in the country legally and their crime was not severe enough to lead to deportation.

Of those already removed, Rocha said:

• 8,584 were convicted of Level 1 crimes, which include murder, kidnapping, sexual assault, robbery, hit-and-run automobile accidents and terrorist threats.

• 17,113 were convicted of Level 2 crimes, which include arson, burglary, money laundering, vehicle theft and embezzlement.

• 5,149 were convicted of Level 3 crimes, which include immigration violations, extortion, property damage, gambling, bribery and violation of election laws.

Congress has supported the program by appropriating a total of $550 million for the database from fiscal 2008 through 2010, Rocha said.

Without the database, it is much easier for people under arrest to lie about their identities and where they were born, said Lt. Rod Torres of the San Bernardino Sheriff's Office in California, which began using Secure Communities in April.

Although most police agencies already run fingerprints through an FBI database, the Homeland Security database has information that the FBI system might not, Torres said.

"We've already seen an increase in cases that are referred to ICE for removal," he said.


Not welcomed by all

Some police agencies, including the sheriff's offices in San Francisco and Chicago, have balked at hooking up to the system.

San Francisco Sheriff Michael Hennessey has said he doesn't want to have to use the system to run checks on people who commit minor crimes and traffic violations, a step that would subject non-dangerous illegal immigrants to deportation. In Chicago, city and county laws prevent local law-enforcement officials from reporting the people they arrest to immigration authorities. Some local agencies fear that if they collaborate with ICE officials, immigrants will no longer come forward to report crimes or serve as witnesses.

Rocha said ICE is not forcing police agencies to participate in the program, which he said targets the most dangerous criminals rather than those convicted of petty offenses.

"We're going to continue working with (the agencies) to explain the program to them, but we won't force them to turn on the system if they're not comfortable," Rocha said.

He said the database may help prevent racial profiling because every person arrested, regardless of skin color or nationality, has his fingerprints run through the system. Police agencies that don't have access to the database decide whether to call ICE to check a person's immigration status.

"If we had a situation where there were concerns of abuse of the system, ICE would investigate thoroughly, as I'm sure local law enforcement would," Rocha said. He said ICE has not received any complaints of racial profiling.

Nystrom, of the immigrant-rights group, said the furor over 287(g) makes her skeptical that ICE can prevent local police agencies from using the program as a weapon to intimidate immigrants.

"Just as with 287(g), we're not seeing the oversight and monitoring by ICE that would alleviate our concerns," she said.

But Rocha said the program is simply about sharing information.

"We want local law-enforcement agencies to know all the facts about the people they have in their jails," he said. "And ICE also wants to know so that we can remove people with criminal convictions for the safety of the local communities. It benefits us all."



Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/ ... z0rsfAUTT6

"San Francisco Sheriff Michael Hennessey has said he doesn't want to have to use the system to run checks on people who commit minor crimes and traffic violations, a step that would subject non-dangerous illegal immigrants to deportation. In Chicago, city and county laws prevent local law-enforcement officials from reporting the people they arrest to immigration authorities. Some local agencies fear that if they collaborate with ICE officials, immigrants will no longer come forward to report crimes or serve as witnesses."

It just amazes me the rationale these two police chiefs attempt to use as to why they wouldn't want this information.

If you are a law enforcement agency and your first duty is to "Protect and Serve" the citizens of your jurisdiction why would you not want access to any and every criminal database available to you to identify who it is that you have arrested? There is no logic behind not wanting access.

They should just come clean and make a statement that is really believable and just say "We don't want ICE access to their database at our jails because we know it would tell us who is here illegally and what prior arrest they might have and we would not be able to ignore it and let them go back into our communities.

It just amazes me that their citizens even tolerate this but I guess if most of your citizens are illegal aliens and your paycheck and job security comes from them then you are not really a true law enforcement officer but instead a puppet of the paycheck.

Their is no logical reason not to want this ICE database access other then to cater to illegals and the Hispanic community and that makes any chief of police a tratior to the meaning of law enforcement and the US.

Why don't they refuse access to the FBI database? Afterall, I am sure the FBI databse (NCIC) might hold some information on illegals they have under arrest.

Well, I always say you reap what you sow so as the squeeze is put on illegals throughout the country in the next five years those who offer "santuary jails" will find their cities overun with criminal illegal aliens finding their safe havens in those cities.

"At first blush, this does seem like a generic computer program that is just about transmitting information," said Brittney Nystrom, director of policy and legal affairs for the National Immigration Forum, an immigrant-rights group. "But once you understand that it's dependent on who is being hauled into the police station in the first place, that raises serious questions for a lot of people."

Brittney, lots of people are past caring.

"Some local agencies fear that if they collaborate with ICE officials, immigrants will no longer come forward to report crimes or serve as witnesses."

Yes well they have a chance to live if they co-operate with the U.S. The machete' gun wielding cartels are a law unto themselves and have already made enough corruption in this country.

Sanctuary = Maywood CA.

We should pass a law that if they choose to become a sanctuary city and they become a Maywood, that the rest of the nation will absolutely not bail them out. That should be a forced city contract with the federal government.