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December 30, 2007

A little salsa on the prairie

"Immigrants have transformed Perry, a charming Midwestern town of 8,000 people, from a fading outpost to a bustling hamlet.

"The Latino population has been the difference between thriving and dying," said Kent Newman, who produced a documentary about the effects of immigration on Perry called A Little Salsa On The Prairie. "Many of the people here have put aside their fear about immigration and it has worked."

But not all Iowa residents are as accepting as those in Perry – and illegal immigration has riled even the most tolerant of Hawkeyes. After years of percolating here, the issue is reaching a zenith just as Iowans prepare to kick off the voting for presidential nominees with their caucuses."

GROMER JEFFERS Jr. in the Dallas Morning News.

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December 23, 2007

Acquitted green card holder may be deported anyway

"Lyglenson Lemorin, acquitted of terrorism charges last week in federal court in Miami, is still a guilty man in the eyes of the U.S. government.

Lemorin, 32, a lawful U.S. resident, remains behind bars -- far from his Miami family -- in the tiny town of Lumpkin, Ga., a deportation center 150 miles south of Atlanta.

On Thursday, Lemorin's wife learned from The Miami Herald that federal authorities have charged her husband with unspecified ''administrative immigration violations'' and that he has been placed in ''removal proceedings'' that could lead to his deportation to his native Haiti."

JAY WEAVER in the Miami Herald.

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December 22, 2007

Judge: Employer-sanctions law stands

"Arizona's employer-sanctions law survived its second legal challenge Friday when a federal judge ruled the public would suffer the greater harm if the measure fails to take effect on schedule.

The decision by U.S. District Court Judge Neil V. Wake clears the way for the measure to become law in 10 days, on Jan. 1. Wake denied a request to block the law temporarily, pending further court hearings on whether it is constitutional."

MARY JO PITZL and RONALD J. HANSEN in the Arizona Republic. 

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December 18, 2007

Bus to the border

"Orange County Register reporters spent a year examining U.S. efforts to deport undocumented immigrants accused of crimes. We interviewed law enforcement officials on both sides of the border, deportees and experts in immigration and international law.

We found a system overwhelmed by the sheer number of immigrants and hampered by public agencies working at cross-purposes. Although there are some successes, there are also unintended consequences."

A three-part series by NORBERTO SANTANA Jr. and TONY SAAVEDRAin the Orange County Register. 

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December 17, 2007

New Jersey abolishes death penalty

With the stroke of the pen, New Jersey became the first state Monday in more than four decades to abolish the death penalty.

Gov. Jon Corzine signed into law a measure that abolishes capital punishment, replacing the death sentence with life in prison without parole. NPR and KPCC.

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NYC residents charge racial bias in police frisks

While New Yorkers applaud the police for the drop in crime and are generally satisfied with police performance, many city residents firmly believe the police use race as a factor in deciding who to stop on the streets. In a survey taken in 2000, 62 percent of respondents said they believed the police racially profiled. This included 79 percent of blacks, 66 percent of Hispanics and 51 percent of whites.

But a recent study challenged such deeply held notions, largely exonerating the New York City Police Department of explicit racial bias in who officers stop and sometimes frisk. AUBREY FOX in the Gotham Gazette.

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A family broken at the border

"All the talk about illegal immigrants made Joe Wood want to "do the right thing."

Three years after the freight loader had married Laura Roldan - who was in the country unlawfully - the Woods were happily raising two U.S.-born daughters in Omaha. But in this era of heightened immigration enforcement, Joe Wood grew fearful that his wife could be snatched away.

He hired a lawyer and began the process to adjust her immigration status.

What in May was supposed to be a family fix-it trip to a U.S. Consulate in Mexico ended up a "nightmare" in which Laura Wood, 33, was accused of past fraud and barred forever from re-entering the United States."

CINDY GONZALEZ in the Omaha World-Herald.

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December 14, 2007

New Poll Explores Racial Tension Among Minorities

The first-of-its-kind poll on race relations between blacks, Latinos and Asians, released yesterday in Washington, D.C., revealed that while ugly stereotypes still hold strong between groups, a majority of those in each group said they should put aside their differences to work toward building better communities.

The poll, conducted by New America Media, shows that high levels of segregation still exist which underlie and support negative stereotypes. More than 75 percent of blacks and Latinos attend religious services with their own kind. More than 65 percent of blacks and Latinos went to school with those of the same ethnicity or race. More than 50 percent of all three groups say most of their friends are of the same race.

Julia Preston of the New York Times has a follow-up story. 

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Border Patrol launches tear gas, pepper spray into Mexico

"In an escalation of clashes between U.S. Border Patrol agents and rock-throwing smugglers, agents have begun launching pepper spray and tear gas into densely populated Mexican border neighborhoods, according to witnesses, Mexican authorities and human rights groups."

RICHARD MAROSI in the Los Angeles Times.

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December 12, 2007

Advocates file complaint over detained immigrant child

"Immigrant advocates have filed complaints over an 8-year-old girl who was separated from her pregnant mother by immigration authorities and left without her for four days at a detention center established to hold families together.

Attorneys with the Immigration Clinic at the University of Texas School of Law sent a complaint on Monday to the Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees detention of immigrants. They also made a complaint to the Texas Department of Protective Services on Nov. 29, said Barbara Hines, a law professor who helps oversee the clinic."

ANABELLE GARAY for the Associated Press.

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December 10, 2007

GOP candidates firm on immigration

In front of what will probably be their most pro-immigration audience, Republican candidates toned down their rhetoric but told Spanish-language television viewers in a debate on Sunday that they would take strong measures to close off the country’s borders to illegal immigration.

The candidates were forced into a difficult balancing act by the debate, broadcast on Univision, as they tried to offend neither the Hispanic audience nor the Republican base many of them have tried to appeal to by taking a hard line on illegal immigration. MICHAEL COOPER and MARC SANTORA in The New York Times.

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Justices widen sentencing power of federal judiciary

The Supreme Court today enhanced the power of federal district judges to use their discretion in arriving at sentences in criminal cases as it upheld a relatively light sentence imposed on a crack cocaine distributor.

By 7 to 2, the court held that “the cocaine guidelines, like all other guidelines, are advisory only.”  DAVID STOUT in The New York Times.

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Showdown in Arizona, Where Mariachis and Minutemen Collide

"PHOENIX — Want to see America unraveling? Come here, to Thomas Road and 35th Street, to M. D. Pruitt’s furniture store. Come on Saturday morning and stand near the eight delivery trucks barricading the parking lot, like the wall of an urban Alamo.

For the last seven weeks, a sidewalk protest here by Latino immigrants has blossomed into a feverish reality show, attracting Minutemen, mariachis, children dancing in Mexican folk costumes, white racists, United Nations observers, Phoenix police officers and Maricopa County sheriff’s deputies.

The weekly confrontation — strident and stalemated — perfectly mimics the national debate. But it’s a sideshow to something even uglier: what happens when immigration’s complexities are handed to local law enforcers sympathetic to the fury of one side."

LAWRENCE DOWNES in the New York Times.

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December 08, 2007

Border issue moves into landowners' yards

"The Bush administration warned landowners along the southern border Friday that it would seize their property if they refused to cooperate with federal efforts to build a fence meant to slow illegal immigration.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he would give landowners 30 days to indicate whether they would allow federal officials on their land to survey its suitability for fencing. If they decline, he said, he would turn to the courts to gain temporary access.

If the agency determines the land is appropriate for fencing and landowners refuse to cooperate, the department will turn to the courts to get title."

NICOLE GAOUETTE in the Los Angeles Times.

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Caught in the middle

"Mirian Villalobos had plenty going for her. The 25-year-old had a dimpled son, a handsome husband, a new house, and a happy suspicion she was pregnant again.

Then, it unraveled.

On a balmy Sept. 6 in Wilmer, outside Dallas, she was pulled over by the police as she rode on the back of a motorcycle driven by her husband, 30-year-old Juan Espinoza. She was stopped for not wearing a helmet, but a routine check of her record found an arrest warrant. She'd been ordered to report for deportation in 2002.

Caught in the middle: an infant named Kevin Isaac, born a U.S. citizen with a father in the U.S. legally and a mother in the U.S. illegally. Ms. Villalobos was deported.

Unable to bear the separation from her son, now 9 months old, she returned to the U.S. in November and was detained in Arizona.

On Thursday she was deported again to Honduras – without seeing her young son and now six months pregnant, her husband says.

Her story is one echoing through many families with mixed immigration status, as a crackdown on illegal immigrants cleaves communities."

DIANNE SOLíS in the Dallas Morning News.

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December 07, 2007

Local police split over immigration enforcement

" Frustrated with ineffective immigration enforcement and often under considerable political pressure, a growing number of states, counties and cities are requiring their law officers to help detect and deport illegal immigrants rather than rely on federal agents.

Yet as more law enforcement agencies sign up for immigration training, local officers are divided over whether their participation significantly reduces local crime or illegal immigration. Many of the jurisdictions forgo the practice, creating a patchwork of different policies across the nation."

MARISA TAYLOR for McClatchy.

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December 05, 2007

Legal help for immigrants, regardless of status

The Manhattan district attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau, announced on Tuesday the creation of an immigrant affairs program to encourage immigrants who are crime victims or are aware of illegal activity to come forward without fear of arrest and deportation. SEWELL CHAN in The New York Times.

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Immigrants sue over citizenship delays

"A group of immigrants in Southern California sued the federal government Tuesday to get an answer on their applications to become U.S. citizens, which have been tied up for months or years in lengthy FBI name checks."

AMY TAXIN in the Orange County Register.

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December 04, 2007

CT lawmakers say prisons cost less than crime

Connecticut's General Assembly is considering some of the most comprehensive criminal justice reforms in a generation. Many of the proposals are targeted at increasing the sentences for individuals accused of certain crimes and some call for increases in mandatory minimum sentences for serious repeat offenders. All of them share the laudable goal of attempting to reduce criminal conduct and enhance public safety in our communities. They also share another common feature: they cost money. BRIAN PRELESKI in the Hartford Courant.

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December 03, 2007

Serving life for loaning killers a car

Early in the morning of March 10, 2003, after a raucous party that lasted into the small hours, a groggy and hungover 20-year-old named Ryan Holle lent his Chevrolet Metro to a friend. That decision, prosecutors later said, was tantamount to murder.

The friend used the car to drive three men to the Pensacola home of a marijuana dealer, aiming to steal a safe. The burglary turned violent, and one of the men killed the dealer’s 18-year-old daughter by beating her head in with a shotgun he found in the home.

Mr. Holle was a mile and a half away, but that did not matter.

He was convicted of murder under a distinctively American legal doctrine that makes accomplices as liable as the actual killer for murders committed during felonies like burglaries, rapes and robberies. ADAM LIPTAK in The New York Times.

 

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Slavery in America

"The number of migrant domestic servants living in involuntary servitude in the United States is a matter for guessing, but there are some well-informed guesses. The State Department report estimated that the total number of people trafficked to the United States annually was 15,000 to 20,000.

The figures do not distinguish between people trafficked for prostitution or factory, farm or domestic work. But advocates including Ms. Flores and Ms. Caron, based on hundreds of cases that filter through their agencies, estimated that domestic workers accounted for about one-third of the total.

In other words, 5,000 to 7,000 migrant domestic servants take jobs each year in homes where they are highly vulnerable to abuse by their employers, they say."

PAUL VITELLO in the New York Times.

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December 02, 2007

Prince William's Folly

"In the Virginia suburbs of Washington, one county has declared war against its undocumented immigrants. With exceedingly limited political clout, the immigrants are still finding ways to fight back."

TARA McKELVEY in The American Prospect.

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Immigration Contractor Trims Wages

"Workers who help process millions of visa and citizenship applications for a federal immigration agency are getting pay reductions just as the agency is facing an enormous surge in those applications."

JULIA PRESTON in the New York Times.

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