Thread: U.S. Immigration cases at record levels in 2009

Wyoming: Illegal immigration cases increasing
Posted: Jan 03, 2010 9:43 PM PST

Associated Press

U.S. Attorney Brendan Johnson says his office's load of illegal immigration cases is growing.

It already makes up the largest single area of federal prosecutions in the state, at 14 percent of all cases.

The U.S. Attorney's office opened 578 immigration cases in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30.

That's up 1.4 percent from the previous year, and up 9.1 percent from 10 years ago.

http://www.kotatv.com/global/story.asp?s=11763159

Feds handle more immigration cases in SD

The Associated Press | Posted: Sunday, January 3, 2010 6:00 pm | (0)

SIOUX FALLS-- U.S. Attorney Brendan Johnson says his office's load of illegal immigration cases is growing and makes up the largest single area of federal prosecutions in South Dakota, at 14 percent of all cases.

The U.S. Attorney's office opened 578 immigration cases in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30. That's up 1.4 percent from the previous year and up 9.1 percent from 10 years ago.

Johnson says individual cases are fairly simple to prosecute and do not put a strain on his office's resources. He says fraudulent documents usually are enough to make a case in federal court.

http://rapidcityjournal.com

Immigration Enforcement Fuels Rise in U.S. Cases - NYTimes.com
Dec 22, 2009 ... Immigration prosecutions were up nearly 16 percent, and made up more than half of all criminal cases brought by the federal government, ...
www.nytimes.com/2009/12/22/us/22crime.html

Chief Justice Roberts
Issues 2009 Year-End Report
Chief Justice John Roberts issued his 2009 year-end report, stating that "courts are operating soundly, and the nation's dedicated federal judges are conscientiously discharging their duties." Details
(December 31, 2009)
http://www.uscourts.gov/newsroom/2009/2 ... Report.pdf

Immigration Crisis Tests Federal Courts on Southwest Border
Federal courts along the southwest border are in crisis mode, contending with ... Immigration-related felony cases have increased 661 percent in that span. ...
www.uscourts.gov/ttb/06-06/border/index.html - Cached - Similar

Approximately 4000 illegals enter the country everyday, by my calculations that is 28,000 a week, their enforcement is not enough....they need to shut the border down, e-verifiy and enforce all laws, attrition will take care of alot of illegals and would be cheaper.


But good information JohnDoe.

Originally Posted by SOSADFORUS

Approximately 4000 illegals enter the country everyday, by my calculations that is 28,000 a month, their enforcement is not enough....they need to shut the border down, e-verifiy and enforce all laws, attrition will take care of alot of illegals and would be cheaper.


But good information JohnDoe.

Math check: 30X4000=120,000

Originally Posted by Ratbstard

Originally Posted by SOSADFORUS

Approximately 4000 illegals enter the country everyday, by my calculations that is 28,000 a month, their enforcement is not enough....they need to shut the border down, e-verifiy and enforce all laws, attrition will take care of alot of illegals and would be cheaper.


But good information JohnDoe.

Math check: 30X4000=120,000

I stand corrected, I said month, I meant week!! that is what happens when you get in a hurry, which I am this morning, glad it wasn't a math test

Originally Posted by SOSADFORUS

Approximately 4000 illegals enter the country everyday, by my calculations that is 28,000 a week, their enforcement is not enough....they need to shut the border down, e-verifiy and enforce all laws, attrition will take care of alot of illegals and would be cheaper.


But good information JohnDoe.

They could always do more. The 27,000 are only the ones who faced charges in federal court for felonies. Illegal entry isn't a felony (but it should be). It isn't even a misdemeanor. It is a civil offense, like a traffic ticket. Re-entry after deportation is a felony. Lesser charges are heard in other courts and aren't included in the 27,000.

RELATED

387,000 illegal aliens removed in F.Y. 2009
http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/0912/091217washington.htm
http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-182539-ice.html+removes


111,000 Criminal Aliens Identified by ICE in 2009
http://www.dhs.gov/ynews/releases/pr_1258044387591.shtm
http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-177810.html

Feds charge record number of immigration crimes

By Howard Mintz
hmintz@mercurynews.com
Posted: 01/04/2010 12:01:00 AM PST

As Israel Gonzalez-Reyes recently stood before a San Jose judge for sentencing, his case had all the ingredients of the most common crime in the nation's federal courts over the past year.

The 39-year-old defendant had been deported to his native Mexico on eight separate occasions, repeatedly returning to the United States before winding up in jail, usually charged with a variety of state crimes ranging from burglary to drunken driving. Federal prosecutors had had enough — this time around, Gonzalez-Reyes was charged under criminal immigration laws forbidding the illegal re-entry of a deported alien back into the United States.

More than ever, federal prosecutors are using such felony charges and the threat of serious federal prison time to make lawbreakers think twice before making another trip across the border. In 2009, the U.S. Justice Department filed nearly 92,000 immigration-related criminal cases in the federal courts. The record-breaking trend accounted for more than half of all new federal prosecutions in the country, according to Justice Department data maintained at Syracuse University.

As of October, the latest figures available, federal prosecutors had filed nearly 300 such cases in the Northern California federal courts, which include San Jose. Syracuse researchers projected that figure would reach nearly 400 by the end of the year, more than double the number filed in 2005. The Bay Area federal courts ranked 10th out of the country's 93 districts in such filings.

Spurred by the relentless surge of illegal immigration in border states such as Texas and Arizona, where immigration prosecutions total in the thousands, the federal government has concluded that simple deportation is no longer an adequate response to repeat offenders with criminal records. Experts attribute the steady rise in prosecutions to several factors, including an increase in immigration and border patrol agents during the Bush administration, and greater emphasis on prosecuting cases that are often easy to prove.

There is ample doubt that criminal enforcement can put much of a dent in the nation's illegal immigration problems. And critics worry that many routine immigration matters are being transformed into federal felony charges with increasingly lengthy sentences. There is also concern about a disproportionate impact on Mexican nationals. A Mercury News review of 52 immigration cases filed in the San Jose federal courts between January and October found every defendant was from Mexico.

"It's riding and walking while Hispanic," said Barry Portman, the Bay Area's federal public defender, whose office typically represents immigrants too poor to pay for their own lawyers.

Supporters of the tougher enforcement approach say the prosecutions are needed to target illegal immigrants with criminal backgrounds who keep re-entering the country. Indeed, the review of the San Jose cases shows these defendants are often unsympathetic. They have typically been deported numerous times, and they carry rap sheets that run the gamut from drug and robbery charges to domestic violence.

In some instances, they have even been prosecuted before in federal court, serving time for immigration crimes before being deported, only to return to the United States. One San Jose defendant charged this year, Esequiel Sandoval-Ramos, has been deported eight times and was convicted four separate times in San Diego federal court on illegal re-entry charges before his most recent arrest here, court records show.

Prosecutors say they must deter illegal immigration by those with criminal records, which is driving up the numbers.

"Does it always work? Of course not," said Brian Stretch, chief of the criminal division for the Bay Area U.S. attorney's office. "But it's important to keep trying."

Advocates for tighter immigration enforcement say such prosecutions are overdue, but they caution criminal charges are only part of dealing with the sprawling immigration issue.

"We need to have these prosecutions, but they are not the silver bullet," said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates stricter measures such as curtailing the ability of illegal immigrants to secure jobs here.

For defendants such as Gonzalez-Reyes, the aggressive prosecutions mean a long prison stay before deportation. In October, a defense lawyer argued that Gonzalez-Reyes' sentence should only be about a year because he had returned to the U.S. this time to earn money for a prosthetic for a child who'd just lost a leg in an accident.

But Gonzalez-Reyes' record was too disturbing for U.S. District Judge James Ware, who sentenced the defendant to 37 months in prison. The question now, as with the tens of thousands of cases being prosecuted in the federal courts, is whether the system will see him again.

"It seems to me like we're putting a finger in the dike," said Kevin Johnson, a University of California-Davis law professor and immigration expert. "These prosecutions are more a gesture than a meaningful attempt to deal with the immigration problem."

Contact Howard Mintz at 408-286-0236.

http://www.mercurynews.com/valley/ci_14116420