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Prosecutor won't limit illegals charged under new immigration law

PHOENIX Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas says he won't let the availability of money or jail space keep him from using a new state law to prosecute people who pay immigrant smugglers to sneak them across the border.

The seven-month-old law was meant to punish immigrant smugglers.

But Thomas says it also can be used against the smugglers' customers, who often face nothing worse than a trip back across the border when they are caught.

The recent decision by Thomas to prosecute 48 illegal immigrants as co-conspirators under the law has been criticized as overreaching and potentially expensive if applied on a wide scale.

The 48 immigrants were indicted today on charges of conspiracy to smuggle people into Arizona.

Republican Representative Jonathan Paton of Tucson, an author of the new law, says the state needs to crack down on people who illegally cross the border but the measure was intended to apply only to smugglers.

Thomas says there won't likely be evidence in every case to prosecute those who are being smuggled.

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