Thread: Judge claims DHS delivering smuggled children to illegal immigrant parents

Judge claims DHS delivering smuggled children to illegal immigrant parents

By Judson Berger
Published December 19, 2013FoxNews.com

March 29, 2013: An immigration agent looks out at the desert near Falfurrias, Texas.REUTERS


A federal judge in Texas is accusing the Department of Homeland Security of hand-delivering children smuggled into the United States to their illegal immigrant parents.
U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen revealed the practice in a blistering court order filed late last week. He said the "dangerous" practice is effectively aiding human traffickers and particularly the drug cartels, which run many of these operations.
"These actions are both dangerous and unconscionable," he wrote.
The judge attempted to lift the curtain on what is happening behind the scenes of the Obama administration's changing approach to immigration enforcement. It has been well-documented that DHS is allowing some illegal immigrants already inside the country to skirt deportation, and particularly those who came to the U.S. as children.
But the "conspiracy" outlined by Hanen would take that controversial policy a big step further. He detailed the case of an illegal immigrant parent in Virginia, but used that as an entry point to describe what he suggested was a broader program.
Hanen claimed that, in more than one case before his court, immigration officials are arresting human traffickers smuggling children into the U.S. -- and then "delivering the minors to the custody of the parent illegally living in the United States."
"The DHS has simply chosen not to enforce the United States' border security laws," he wrote.
Further, he said this is simply encouraging risky smuggling operations. "Time and again this court has been told by representatives of the government and the defense that cartels control the entire smuggling process," Hanen wrote. "... the government is not only allowing [illegal immigrants in the U.S.] to fund the illegal and evil activities of these cartels, but is also inspiring them to do so."
He added: "To put this in another context, the DHS policy is as logical as taking illegal drugs or weapons that it has seized from smugglers and delivering them to the criminals who initially solicited their illegal importation/exportation. Legally, this situation is no different."
Representatives with the Department of Homeland Security and other immigration agencies have not yet returned a request for comment on the judge's statement.
Chris Crane, president of the National ICE Council union, told FoxNews.com the judge's claims are "absolutely correct."
"This is exactly what's happening," he said, describing how agents "can't keep up" with the number of minors crossing the border, either by themselves or in the custody of smugglers. Crane said immigration officials, then, are tasked with finding a place for the children to go.
"That's what we do now. We babysit kids and change diapers," he said. "It's out of control."
Crane said the best short-term solution would be to return the children to the family members they were staying with in their home country.
The judge's statement was prompted by the case of Mirtha Veronica Nava-Martinez. She was arrested at the Texas-Mexico border in May and pleaded guilty to trying to smuggle a 10-year-old child originally from El Salvador. After the sentencing, the judge wrote, he decided to go public with additional details from the case.
He wrote that the "conspiracy" started when an illegal immigrant in Virginia hired smugglers to get her daughter from El Salvador to Virginia. She paid $6,000 in advance. But after the smuggling operation was interrupted by federal agents, he wrote, "the DHS delivered the child to her."
Further, he wrote, this was the fourth case he'd seen in as many weeks along these lines. In one case, he claimed, the U.S. government "flew a child to multiple locations" in the U.S. at the expense of U.S. taxpayers. "This is an absurd and illogical result," he wrote.
The judge noted that after the court inquired about the incidents, a federal prosecutor apparently "requested" that the mother in Virginia be placed in immigration proceedings. He said it's unclear whether that has happened, and he's been told the government will not pursue prosecution.
Hanen wrote that he is "not unsympathetic" to the parents in these cases, but noted the danger these children are put in.
"If [DHS officials] persist in this policy, more children are going to be harmed, and the DHS will be partly responsible because it encourages this kind of Russian roulette," he wrote.


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013...rents-smuggle/

Judge: DHS delivering young illegals caught at border to illegal immigrant parents

12:37 PM 12/19/2013
Caroline May
Political Reporter

A case out of Texas has a federal judge asking just which side of the law the Department of Homeland Security is working for.
United States District Judge for the Southern District of Texas Brownsville Division Andrew S. Hanen rebuked DHS for helping to deliver an illegal immigrant minor — detained at the border with her human smuggler — to her illegal immigrant mother living in Virginia.
Homeland Security “successfully complet[ed] the mission of the criminal conspiracy” to smuggle the child across the border to her parent, the judge wrote in an order issued on Dec. 13.

The mother, Patricia Elizabeth Salmeron Santos, had agreed to pay $8,500 to have human smugglers bring her child from El Salvador to Virginia.
The smuggler, Mirtha Veronica Nava-Martinez, was arrested and the child detained at a Texas border checkpoint when they were caught trying to use a birth certificate that belonged to Nava-Martinez’s daughter.
Nava-Martinez, a resident alien, also had a prior felony for food-stamp fraud in 2011.
“Despite this setback, the goal of the conspiracy was completed thanks to the actions of the United States Government,” Hanen wrote. “This Court is quite concerned with the apparent policy of the Department of Homeland Security (hereinafter ‘DHS’) of completing the criminal mission of individuals who are violating the border security of the United States.”
“Customs and Border Protection agents stopped the Defendant at the border inspection point. She was arrested, and the child was taken into custody. The DHS officials were notified that Salmeron Santos instigated this illegal conduct,” the judge continued. “Yet, instead of arresting Salmeron Santos for instigating the conspiracy to violate our border security laws, the DHS delivered the child to her — thus successfully completing the mission of the criminal conspiracy. It did not arrest her. It did not prosecute her. It did not even initiate deportation proceedings for her. The DHS policy is a dangerous course of action.”

This was “the fourth case with the same factual situation this court has had in as many weeks,” Hanen wrote.
In each of those cases, Hanen explained, illegal immigrant minors — whose illegal immigrant parent or parents were paying human smugglers to bring them into the United States — detained prior to arriving at their destination were delivered to their illegal immigrant parents by DHS.
The judge noted that in all four cases, the American taxpayer ended up on the hook for the final delivery.
“In all cases when the Government apprehended some of the traffickers, the Government transported the children across the country to unite them with a parent (or parents) who was in the country illegally. In one situation, the Government flew a child to multiple locations in different parts of the United States. The taxpayers of the United States suffer the expense of delivering these minors,” Hanen wrote.
“This is an absurd and illogical result. The DHS could reunite the parent and child by apprehending the parent who has committed not one, by at least two different crimes,” he continued.
The judge added that “the failure by DHS to enforce current United States law” is concerning because illegal activities of this kind help fund drug cartels. It also undermines the deterrent effect of the nation’s immigration laws and lowers the moral of the men and women risk their lives to enforce the law, he wrote.
The order comes as Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions and the union representing ICE officers and staff have been sounding the alarm about lack of immigration enforcement at DHS, with the Alabama lawmaker recently issuing a “Timeline of Administrative Non-Enforcement of Federal Immigration Law.”
DHS did not immediately respond to request for comment.

Read a copy of the court order:

Copy of the Judges order at the Page Link:

http://dailycaller.com/2013/12/19/dh...grant-parents/

By Stephen Dinan
The Washington Times
Thursday, December 19, 2013


Photo by: Gregory Bull
**FILE** U.S. Border Patrol agent Jerry Conlin looks to the north on June 13, 2013, near where the border wall ends as is separates Tijuana, Mexico and San Diego. (Associated Press)

A federal judge in Texas late last week accused the Obama administration of aiding drug cartels, saying that instead of enforcing immigration laws, agents knowingly helped smuggle an illegal immigrant girl into the U.S. to live with her mother, also an illegal immigrant, in Virginia.

In a 10-page order, Judge Andrew S. Hanen said the case was the fourth such case he's seen over the last month, and in each instance Customs and Border Protection agents have helped to locate and deliver the children to their illegal immigrant parents.

The judge said in each case, the taxpayers footed the bill for flights — including flights to multiple locations in different parts of the U.S. that it took to find one of the children's parents.

"The DHS is rewarding criminal conduct instead of enforcing the current laws. More troubling, the DHS is encouraging parents to seriously jeopardize the safety of their children," the judge said, adding that some of the children have been made to swim the Rio Grande River or traverse remote areas as part of the smuggling.

In the case before the judge last week, a 10-year-old girl whose mother, Patricia Elizabeth Salmeron Santos, paid a smuggler to get the daughter from El Salvador across the border and to Virginia.

The agents apprehended the smuggler and the young girl, and prosecuted the smuggler, but delivered the daughter to Ms. Salmeron Santos in Virginia, even though agents were aware she was in the country illegally.

"The DHS, instead of enforcing our border security laws, actually assisted the criminal conspiracy in achieving its illegal goals," the judge said. "It completed the mission of the conspiracy initiated by Salmeron Santos. In summary, instead of enforcing the laws of the United States, the government took direct steps to help the individuals who violated it. A private citizen would, and should, be prosecuted for this conduct."

Judge Hanen said that Homeland Security officials regularly testify that the drug cartels control immigrant smuggling operations along the border, and he said the department's actions in helping finish the smuggling actually end up benefitting the very cartels U.S. officials say they are trying to damage.

"The big economic losers in this scenario are the citizens of the United States who, by virtue of this DHS policy, are helping fund these evil ventures with their tax dollars," the judge wrote.

Homeland Security officials told the court they won't prosecute the illegal immigrant parents for their role in the smuggling, and Judge Hanen said it appeared to be a department-wide policy. Officials did say they are considering trying to deport Salmeron Santos, though it was unclear whether that had been done.

The cases highlight a growing problem along the border of what the government terms unaccompanied alien children, or UACs. Apprehensions of UACs jumped 81 percent from 2010 to 2012, suggesting more and more illegal immigrant parents are taking the risk of having their children leave home to join them in the U.S.

The young children present sympathetic cases, just as do those already in the country, known as Dreamers, after the Dream Act legislation.

President Obama last year announced a new policy to halt deportations of those young illegal immigrants, arguing they were brought to the U.S. by their parents with no say in the decision, and so should be allotted special treatment.

Immigrant-rights advocates now want the parents of the Dreamers to be spared deportation, arguing it is morally wrong to separate families.

But Judge Hanen said in the cases before him the illegal immigrants made that decision themselves, often years before. In the case of the 10-year-old, he said Ms. Salmeron Santos chose to come to the U.S. without her daughter years ago.

"She purposefully chose this course of action. Her decision to smuggle the child across the border, even if motivated by the best of motives, is not an excuse for the United States government to further a criminal conspiracy, and by doing so, encourage others to break the law and endanger additional children," the judge wrote.

"To put this in another context, the DHS policy is as logical as taking illegal drugs or weapons that it has seized from smugglers and delivering them to the criminals who initially solicited their illegal importation/exportation. Legally, this situation is no different."

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...igrant-chil/?1

Added The Washington Times article to the Homepage:
http://www.alipac.us/content.php?r=2...n-into-the-U-S

December 20, 2013
Judicial Watch

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) participates in criminal conspiracies by helping human traffickers smuggle the children of illegal immigrants into the U.S. through the Mexican border, according to a scathing federal court order that accuses the agency of “rewarding criminal conduct instead of enforcing the current laws.”

It’s so outrageous it would seem like a fabricated story if it weren’t outlined in an official court document issued recently by Judge Andrew S. Hanen in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. Judge Hanen reveals that the specific case outlined in the order is not unique but rather the fourth in as many weeks involving similar schemes and atrocious conduct by the federal agency responsible for protecting national security.

“This court is quite concerned with the apparent policy of the Department of Homeland Security of completing the criminal mission of individuals who are violating the border security of the United States,” Judge Hanen writes. It gets better. The judge reveals that American taxpayers are funding these illicit plots. “The big economic losers in this scenario are the citizens of the United States who, by virtue of this DHS policy, are helping fund these evil ventures with their tax dollars,” the order says.

The case involves a 10-year-old girl with an illegal immigrant mother living in Virginia. The mother, Patricia Elizabeth Salmeron Santos, agreed to pay a smuggler $8,500 to bring the girl to Virginia from El Salvador. The smuggler received a $6,000 advance, but got busted by the U.S. Border Patrol en route. The government still delivered the girl to her illegal alien mother in the U.S. and Uncle Sam picked up the tab for travel, lodging and the federal escort. Nothing happened to the illegal alien mother who hired the smuggler.

A number of other cases with similar circumstances have come before this particular court and the judge expresses outrage in the ruling. “The DHS, instead of enforcing our border security laws, actually assisted the criminal conspiracy in achieving its illegal goals,” he writes. “It completed the mission of the conspiracy initiated by Slameron Santos. In summary, instead of enforcing the laws of the United States, the government took direct steps to help the individuals who violated it. A private citizen would, and should, be prosecuted for this conduct.”

Because drug cartels control immigrant smuggling operations along the southern border, DHS is also assisting those criminal enterprises. The agency confirmed to the court that it won’t prosecute illegal immigrant parents for smuggling their kids into the U.S. nor does it have any intention of deporting them. This not only rewards criminal conduct, the judge says, it encourages parents to seriously jeopardize the safety of their children.

Some of the smuggled kids are abandoned by their smugglers, assaulted, kidnapped, raped or killed, the judge writes. He mentions recent cases in which two illegal aliens drowned, two more are missing and a Salvadorian toddler was abandoned by smugglers just outside of Brownsville Texas. Judge Hanen offers a more sensible solution to this growing problem of separated immigrant families.

“The DHS could reunite the parent and child by apprehending the parent who has committed not one, but at least two different crimes,” the order says. “It would be more efficient for the government to arrest the individuals who are not only in the country illegally, but while in the country illegally are also fostering illegal conspiracies.”

http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/20...minal-mission/

Eric Holder will get right on this and ensure those guilty are NOT punished ..