Thread: Agencies defend program aiding immigration enforcement

BY ADAM WALLWORTH

Posted on Monday, March 16, 2009

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Government criticism of a federal program that allows local police to enforce immigration laws is inaccurate, police chiefs in Rogers and Springdale say.

The program's effectiveness is diminished because it doesn't keep local police focused on catching illegal aliens committing serious crimes, the report released this month from the Government Accounting Office says. Instead the program is deporting immigrants caught for less-serious issues.

"Ours does not lack that focus," Rogers Police Chief Steve Hamilton said about the 287(g) task force in Northwest Arkansas that his city was instrumental in creating in September 2007. The program initially was touted as a way to have local police help catch illegal immigrants who are committing major crimes. Police aren't prevented from seeking to deport people on minor offenses, the report said, but Immigration and Customs Enforcement "would not have detention space to detain all of the aliens referred to them."

Arresting suspects for lesser crimes is part of building a case regardless of citizenship, Springdale Police Chief Kathy O'Kelley said. The arrest of people on minor infractions might make it seem like the program isn't pursuing its goals, but that is precisely why quantitative analysis isn't a reliable way to gauge success, she said.

"I don't judge success in Springdale by the arrests we make," she said.

It will take years to determine whether the program is successful, O'Kelley said, adding that success will be measured in the reduction of crime.

"We know that we have criminal activity going on in Springdale that we can't get to," she said. "These task forces give us an avenue to get there."

Known as 287(g), a reference to the section of a 1996 law authorizing it, the program has been promoted by immigration officials as an important tool in deporting serious criminals. In addition to Springdale and Rogers police, both Washington and Benton counties participate in the local task force.

LACK OF SUPERVISION

The Government Accounting Office report said immigration bureau officials are not closely supervising how their agreements with the local agencies had been carried out, had inconsistently described the program's goals, and had failed to spell out what data should be tracked, collected and reported. Some law enforcement agencies had used the program to deport immigrants "who have committed minor crimes, such as carrying an open container of alcohol," the report said, and at least four agencies referred minor traffic offenders for deportation.

Washington County's agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement states the mission of the task force "is to identify and remove criminal aliens," said Jay Cantrell, chief deputy for Washington County.

Immigration status is checked at the jail any time a detainee is suspected to be an illegal alien, Cantrell said. It doesn't matter whether the person is picked up for driving on a suspended driver's license or murder, he said.

"If they're arrested and brought to jail, that's the trigger," Cantrell said.

Cantrell said the county focuses on enforcement at the jail but has an officer assigned to the task force. He said the county's two 287(g)-trained jailers will investigate anyone booked who is suspected of being in the country illegally. When someone is arrested who doesn't speak English or have any identification it raises questions, he said.

The local steering committee in charge of the task force hasn't set a level of crime to trigger status checks, he said.

FEW LOCAL DETAILS

The GAO report analyzed 29 of the 67 law enforcement agencies in the program. It found that they arrested 43,000 illegal immigrants last year, including 34,000 taken into custody by the immigration bureau.

Of the 34,000, the report said, about 41 percent were put in removal proceedings, 44 percent waived their right to a hearing and were immediately deported, and 15 percent were released for reasons including humanitarian grounds, the "minor nature of their crime" or having been sentenced to prison.

Hamilton was adamant that his officers are focused on rooting out the kind of criminals the program was sold on, such as drug smuggling and human trafficking. He said their case files show they are doing what was promised.

"They're focusing on major offenses - serious criminals," Hamilton said, but declined to go into detail on the cases he said weren't under his purview. "You can ask that question to ICE," he said.

Specifics about what local officers do under 287(g) are hard to come by.

Department of Homeland Security spokesman Michael Keegan, in an e-mail, said local authorities have assisted in identifying 344 people in Arkansas who won't contest deportation this fiscal year.

Keegan said the department does not capture statistics on how many people are deported. The number of people identified as being in the country illegally is logged in the database as people are searched, he said.

The crimes illegal aliens are originally arrested on are not something Immigration and Customs Enforcement tracks, Keegan said. Those charges would have to come from the arresting agency. However, local departments refuse to comment on arrests or numbers of deportations made by the task force.

The Northwest Arkansas task force made its first arrest Sept. 24, 2007, when an illegal alien went to the Washington County jail to register as a sex offender.

The highest-profile case was the Acambaro Mexican Restaurant investigation. Police raided the chain in December 2007, accusing the chain of hiring illegal workers and money laundering. The case ended last year with a plea agreement that included a $400,000 fine and misdemeanor guilty pleas for some of the chain's leaders, which seemed to puzzle U.S. District Judge Jimm L. Hendren.

"I don't want to say it's a payoff, but I need an explanation," he said before approving the arrangement.

Early on, one member of the task force was the subject of two complaints of racial discrimination. The undercover Springdale police officer accused of taunting detainees and targeting Hispanics was cleared after an internal review.

The federal report did not conclude whether agencies involved with the program engaged in racial profiling, but that is something departments must guard against, O'Kelley said. Departments have policies against racial profiling regardless of whether the officer is on the task force.

"No sheriff, no chief can say that happens 100 percent of the time, but that's what we train them to do and that's our expectation," O'Kelley said.

The inability to guarantee against racial profiling is why Benton County Sheriff Keith Ferguson limits his department's participation to jail deputies checking residential status.

"I didn't think my department was ready and I'm still not real comfortable putting them on the streets," Ferguson said about 287(g)-certified officers. "I can't look at somebody and tell if they're illegal. I ain't got that ability. I don't think anybody has."

The program has helped deputies build cases against rapists, murderers, drug dealers and child molesters, Ferguson said. He estimated the majority of the 600 or so illegal aliens arrested by his office have been guilty of crimes fitting the goals of the program.

"If the program is not worked right then you've got problems," he said. "I feel comfortable with the way we do it and we'll continue to work that way as long as the program exists."

REACTIONS VARY

In a response included in the report, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said they have made changes that address the report's findings and support the report's five recommendations, including clarifying the circumstances under which 287(g) authority should be used, spelling out the agency's supervisory role and establishing ways to measure performance.

The agency said it would release details in the next two months on how it would improve the program.

Changes to the program worry those who fear the new administration is too soft on illegal aliens, said Bob Dane, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform in Washington D.C.

"When did being in this country illegally end being a crime worthy of deportation?" Dane said.

Dane said the program was never intended to be limited to a small group of violent criminals. If the program is limited only to certain criminal types, he said, it will leave out such a large number of illegal aliens that it will be "in and of itself a massive amnesty plan."

The report highlights parts of the program that are most troublesome to League of United Latin American Citizens, said Brent Wilkes, executive director of the Washington D.C.-based organization.

Wilkes said the premise of using the law to target only serious criminals is a ruse used to gain support for such measures as 287(g).

"What they never bother telling you is how many of them are serious criminals," Wilkes said. "What we suspect they are doing is they get the authority and go after the average law abiding" illegal alien.

At issue is that certain groups of people are being held to a different standard, Wilkes said. As the report states, one agency began deportation proceedings after arresting someone for having an open container, a crime Wilkes said wouldn't mean jail time for an average citizen.

To contact this reporter:

awallworth@arkansasonline.com

------ · ------Information for this article contributed by Randal C. Archibold of The New York Times. WHAT IS 287(G)?

The Northwest Arkansas Immigration Criminal Apprehension Task Force was established in 2007 to augment federal prosecution of illegal aliens.

The task force was the first in the country as a partnership between local law enforcement agencies and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

It gets its name from section 287(g) of the 1996 Immigration and Nationality Act.

Officers with Rogers and Springdale police departments and Benton and Washington county sheriff's offices are authorized to enforce federal immigration laws under the direction of ICE agents. The counties operate immigration databases out of their jails, while task force members conduct investigations in cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

There are 13 task forces around the country and 597 officers trained under the program.

Local officers assisted in finding 344 illegal aliens that will not fight deportation this fiscal year.

http://www.nwanews.com/adg/News/255098/

Has our local police and others loss their minds. So they think breaking into our country is not a crime? And we the taxpayers must pay the police salaries and support the undocumented immigrants permitted to take Americans jobs.

Didnt you know? We lost our sovereignty already.


"So they think breaking into our country is not a crime?"