Thread: TN-Shelby County Jail screens inmates' immigration statuses

Shelby County Jail screens inmates' immigration statuses
By Kristina Goetz
August 1, 2010 at midnight

What country were you born in?

In what country do you claim citizenship?

Do you claim citizenship from any other country?

Those three questions have been posed to every person booked in the Shelby County Jail since 2008 in an effort to identify illegal immigrants charged with crimes and report them to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. If law enforcement officials believe inmates aren't telling the truth, they can still contact the feds.

"We knew that we had an issue with immigration, and we knew we needed to establish a process to work with ICE to try to identify those people that needed to be deported," said Shelby County Sheriff Mark Luttrell.

Of the 50,000 to 55,000 people booked annually, less than 2 percent are illegal immigrants, he said.

The debate about illegal immigration continues across the country in the wake of a lawsuit filed by the Obama administration last month against Arizona over the state's strict new immigration law.

The law says that an officer engaged in a lawful stop, detention or arrest shall, when practicable, ask about a person's legal status when reasonable suspicion exists that the person is in the United States illegally.

Last week, a federal judge ruled that controversial parts of the law should be blocked from taking effect until the courts resolve the issues.

Despite the controversy other states seem poised to follow Arizona's lead.

But communities across the United States have, for years, identified illegal immigrants and alerted federal authorities. In fact, the practice is promoted by a slew of federal programs that connect local law enforcement agencies' community knowledge with federal expertise.

The Shelby County Jail participates in several programs, including the Criminal Alien Program and the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program.

Under CAP, ICE officers work with prisons and jails across the country to screen inmates already arrested for other crimes and place detainers on illegal immigrants to process them for removal before they're released.

"If somebody is booked today that's got a questionable status, we notify ICE, and within a matter of hours they're in our facility, " said Steve Shular, spokesman for the Shelby County Sheriff's Office. "There's almost an immediate response.

The SCAAP program pays hundreds of millions of dollars each year to communities around the nation for the cost of jailing convicted criminals believed to be illegal immigrants.

Shelby County falls near the middle of more than 900 agencies nationwide that receive those federal reimbursements.

Only 12 of Tennessee's 95 counties received payments during the 2009 fiscal year. Shelby County received $48,573 compared to Metro Nashville and Davidson County's $293,780. In Shelby County, the money is divided between the jail and the Shelby County Corrections Center.

The total for Tennessee was just over $1 million, ranking the Volunteer State 30th among the 50 states.

That pales in comparison to California and New York, for example, which received nearly $159 million and $46 million, respectively.

"We don't rely that heavily on the SCAAP program for identification purposes," Luttrell said.

"It's just a revenue source for those illegals that we house in the jail.

"The financial assistance is certainly something that we like to have, but it is a nominal amount of money."

Mauricio Calvo, executive director of Latino Memphis, a group that advocates for the betterment of the Hispanic community, said he thinks immigration issues should be enforced by federal agencies charged with that mission. Local law enforcement resources would be better utilized catching criminals, he said.

"I do want to be careful," he said. "We don't have a problem when those resources are used when someone has been convicted of a serious crime.

"That's OK, sure, fine. It's important for law enforcement agencies to talk to each other, but once people have come through the legal process of going through a trial and being convicted, not just when somebody has been arrested."

-- Kristina Goetz: 529-2380

Data reporter Grant Smith and the Scripps Howard News Service contributed.

Tracking inmates

Every inmate booked into the Shelby County Jail is questioned about his or her immigration status. This is a breakdown of the number of inmates interviewed, those referred to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and those released to the federal agency in 2010.

January

Interviewed: 3,806

Referred: 52

Released: 13

February

Interviewed: 3,861

Referred: 79

Released: 18

March

Interviewed: 4,448

Referred: 69

Released: 20

April

Interviewed: 4,578

Referred: 73

Released: 22

May

Interviewed: 4,260

Referred: 76

Released: 33

June

Interviewed: 4,730

Referred: 53

Released: 28

-- Grant Smith


http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/20 ... -statuses/

I opened an account there so I could post to comments.


Bighouse writes:

in response to 1American:

It should be mandatory that EVERYONE be able to provide identification on public property if there is reasonable cause for an officer to stop that person..... BUT----Obama wants the illegals to be given amnesty because they are poor and need a handout. If he can make them citizens, he can give them government assistance (funded by your taxes) and that ensures they will vote for more government handouts by voting for Obama and the democrats. This is pure and simple socialism. This is how the Democrats destroy America and get power.

Another neocon zombie who has been marinated in Fox News propaganda for so long all his synapses are dead...

If this article is read with an open mind, despite the constant yammering from the frothing racist right, it would appear that illegals who commit crimes are actually an insignificant problem in Shelby County.

Two percent? Give me a break.


Bighouse you are invited to a party! Only 100 people will be attending. It is guaranteed that 2 of the attendees will be lucky enough to experience one of the following: Death, Rape, Robbery or Physical Assault.

Please RSVP ASAP!

"Two percent? Give me a break."

As a new "poster" my comment must be screened before it is added to the C section.