Appeals court to rule tomorrow inMorris County defendant deportation case
By Peggy Wright • July 7, 2009

The state Supreme Court will release its decision Wednesday on how much impact a deportation detainer can have on the setting of bails for illegal aliens charged with crimes in New Jersey.


The ruling on the Morris County-based case known as State v. Manuel Fajardo Santos is being awaited by prosecutors and defense attorneys around the state for the guidance it is expected to give on appropriate bails for criminally-accused aliens who also are faced with possible deportation.

Fajardo-Santos, an illegal immigrant from Honduras, was charged in August 2008 with sexually abusing a 9-year-old girl in Wharton. The federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement filed an immigration detainer against him in December.

Fajardo-Santos posted $75,000 bail on the criminal charge and ICE, acting on its detainer, picked him up at the county jail on Jan. 12. Based upon the unanticipated, earlier deportation of a different sex offender, Morris County prosecutors scrambled to persuade a judge to increase bail to $300,000 and Fajardo-Santos was returned to the jail. There is no law in place requiring ICE to postpone acting on a deportation detainer just because criminal charges are pending against a suspect.

Prosecutors contend that victims and defendants themselves have the right to have charges adjudicated before a defendant is deported from the country.

http://tinyurl.com/nhjnwf