Publicado el 09-25-2008
Reportero: ROBERT McCARSON
School resource officer asked Erwin High student if he is "illegal"
Students stage brief walk-out, claiming deputy also asked if the Rosary was a symbol of gang membership


ASHEVILLE. -- A school resource officer at Clyde A. Erwin High School asked an Hispanic student whether he was in the country illegally while lodging criminal charges against him and other students for a fight that broke out in the school’s cafeteria last Tuesday.
North Carolina law requires school-age children to attend school regardless of their immigration status. The Rev. William Ameche, a Catholic priest who works with the Hispanic ministry for the Asheville Vicarate of the Diocese of Western North Carolina, said that inquiries about immigration status could not only discourage undocumented Hispanic students from coming to school for fear that they and their families might be discovered by immigration authorities, “it is racial profiling.â€