Editorial: Kilmartin keeps promise

01:00 AM EST on Sunday, January 23, 2011

Rhode Island Atty. Gen. Peter Kilmartin has kept his pledge to make neighborhoods safer by cracking down on illegal immigrants who break the law in other ways. As one of his first acts, he signed an agreement to implement the federal Secure Communities initiative. He’s right about this.

Under that program, the fingerprints of arrested suspects are checked against a Homeland Security/FBI database. When the fingerprints match immigration records, Immigration and Customs Enforcement is notified for possible action.

ICE contends that it makes a priority of “removing criminal aliens convicted of the most serious crimes, such as murder, rape, kidnapping, major drug offenses and national security.â€