Group presses Metro Police on immigrant policy
It says federal program targeting illegal defendants for deportation is flawed
By Timothy Pratt

Saturday, July 18, 2009 | 2 a.m.





A coalition of immigration lawyers, civil liberties advocates and community activists is pressuring Metro Sheriff Doug Gillespie to abandon a controversial eight-month-old program that identifies illegal immigrants in jail for eventual deportation.

The group, which includes the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, the local chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and Democracia USA, a nonprofit organization, is seizing on two recent events and attacking the program with petitions, letters and meetings.

First, the federal government announced changes in the program, known as 287(g), on July 10 and gave local jurisdictions 90 days to accept or reject the new setup. Second, a well-attended public meeting July 16 at Pearson Community Center hardened the group’s opposition to the program. Members of the organizations say civil liberties are being violated, crime-fighting goals aren’t being met and community relations with police in heavily Hispanic neighborhoods are falling apart.

“We want to use this 90-day period to impress upon Gillespie that the negatives outweigh the positives,â€