"Antiterror tactic is assailed, defended; Detainees held without charges" by Maria Sacchetti, Globe Staff | May 22, 2010
They have not been charged with any crime.
Their arrests are part of a controversial law enforcement tactic that allows US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, commonly called ICE, to hold people for civil immigration violations while investigators attempt to build criminal cases against them.
Keeps them busy I guess.
Federal officials say it is a valuable tool in the fight against terrorism, and its use increased after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The fallout from that fateful day extended far beyond tower dropping at free-fall speed into their own footprint.
But civil liberties advocates and others say the government is sidestepping the criminal process by limiting detainees’ access to lawyers and keeping them in jail. Some analysts say the tactics used by ICE could also alienate immigrant communities that are vital to helping solve crimes and preclude chances of wider evidence gathering.
“I think there’s an overuse of ICE in these cases,’’ said Vincent M. Cannistraro, who led counterterrorism operations for the CIA until 1991 and now issues a newsletter on global security issues from Virginia. “If you suspect that they’re there, watch them. You can tap their phones. You can basically monitor their activities until you do get the information you need.’’
An "ex"-CIA guy says?
While police, the FBI, and other law enforcement agencies require evidence of crimes to arrest people, immigration officials require only a violation of the civil immigration law, such as an expired visa....
Authorities can use immigration laws, including the threat of deportation, as leverage to get information.
Why not just torture them because I've been told that works?
Earlier this year, New York subway bombing suspect Najibullah Zazi increased his cooperation with authorities after they threatened to charge his mother with immigration offenses and after they charged his Afghan-born father with crimes, according to an account in The Washington Post.
Ah, ANOTHER COERCED and WORTHLESS -- but valuable agenda-pushing -- confession!
For more on the case scroll my Zazi file.
FBI spokeswoman Gail Marcinkiewicz said ICE is a key part of the Joint Anti-Terrorism Task Force in Boston, where federal, state, and local agencies regularly collaborate on antiterrorism efforts, she said.
“The reason we have task forces in this day and age is that not any one law enforcement agency can do it alone,’’ she said.
But civil liberties groups say the broad use of immigration laws leaves the system vulnerable to abuses. ICE and the immigration courts are not subject to the same public scrutiny as are the police and the regular court system. ICE routinely refuses to release detainees’ names, and their court files are not available to the public.
The agency has jailed 27-year-old Baskaran Balasundaram, a Sri Lankan, for nearly two years on concerns that he provided support to a terrorist group in his homeland, even though he said he had been kidnapped by them and forced to live like a slave. In 2009, a federal judge granted him asylum based on his story of kidnap and, later, torture by the Sri Lankan Army, but he remains in jail. The American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts is fighting in court for his release.
Related: Return to Sri Lanka
Yeah, he was let go.
“Their public face is that they’re using immigration as a tool of law enforcement and say they’re really going after the worst of the worst,’’ said Laura Rótolo, staff attorney for the ACLU of Massachusetts. “But in reality, they’re deporting increasing numbers of people’’ who have not been convicted of crimes....
Related:
The Illegal Immigrant Imprisonment Industry
Illegals Already Have Amnesty
Then the wealthy don't have to bother with icky-pooh health and social security taxes or complaints, etc.
Also see: Obama Administration to Ignore Immigration Enforcement
That takes care of that.
Donald Kerwin — vice president of programs at the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank based in Washington — said the government should make national security the priority. The risk of detaining people for immigration violations, he said, is that if the government fails to build a criminal case against them, they may end up deporting them and setting them free in their homelands.
“That’s where the rationale falls apart,’’ Kerwin added. “If you really suspect that somebody was a terrorist sympathizer or somebody who provided material support, unless there was no possibility of a criminal case against them, why would you release them to their country of nationality where they could stage attacks against the United States?’’
Brian Kyes, police chief of Chelsea, the city with the state’s highest percentage of immigrants, said police in immigrant communities often walk a fine line with ICE to keep their communities safe. He makes clear that Chelsea police do not enforce federal immigration law, so that immigrants feel comfortable reporting crimes whether they are in the country legally or not.
But, Kyes said, he willingly works with ICE to arrest violent criminals and gang members....
And if are not terrorist they forget all about you:
"Plight of mentally ill detainees detailed" by Associated Press | July 26, 2010
NEW YORK — Thousands of mentally disabled immigrants are entangled in deportation proceedings each year with little or no legal help, leaving them distraught, defenseless, and detained as their fates are decided, according to a report issued yesterday by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union, which exhorted federal authorities to do better.
Shortcomings outlined by the two groups include no right to appointed counsel, inflexible detention policies, insufficient guidance for judges on handling people with mental disabilities, and inadequately coordinated services to aid detainees.
Hey, what do you expect with disposable labor?
“No one knows what to do with detainees with mental disabilities, so every part of the immigration system has abdicated responsibility,’’ said Sarah Mehta, the report’s lead author. “The result is people languishing in detention for years while their legal files — and their lives — are transferred around or put on indefinite hold.’’
Might as well be a "terrorist."
The federal agencies involved in the deportation system are well aware of many of the problems cited in the report, and Mehta said she has been cautiously encouraged by some recent steps to better handle people with mental disabilities.
For example, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency which arrests and detains people facing deportation, will host a national forum in September seeking input from mental health experts on ways to improve its practices.
--more--"
Clear the Court: Boning Immigrants
We have enough money for wars, banks, and Israel but we can't keep wards of the state alive in AmeriKa?
Oh, I'm sorry, government is on the case:
"US considers softening immigrant detention sites; Freer style to end prison-like setting for non-criminals" by Michelle Roberts, Associated Press | June 17, 2010
SAN ANTONIO — In an agreement US immigration officials hope will begin to reshape the entire 30,000-bed detention system, some asylum-seekers and immigrants awaiting deportation proceedings could soon be held in facilities where they can wear their own clothes, participate in movie and bingo nights, eat continental breakfasts, and celebrate holidays with visiting family members.
So it will be like a VACATION, huh?
And that foreclosed American living in the tent city outside of town?
It could end confinement in prison-like facilities — complete with razor wire, jail-style uniforms, armed guards, and partitions that prevent physical contact with loved ones — for those never convicted of a crime or considered a threat.
NO WONDER the immigration problem is NEVER $OLVED!
Overall, the facilities are expected to be less prison-like, offering freer movement for detainees, fewer patdowns, and better access to legal resources. The agreement calls for fresh vegetables and access to self-serve beverages along with cooking and exercise classes, according to a list released by ICE.
CCA will soften “the look for the facility with hanging plants, flower baskets, new paint colors, different bedding and furniture’’ and allow lengthy visits from friends and family who can provide packages or food for special celebrations under changes over the next six months....
Many are held only a few nights before being deported, while others — particularly those seeking asylum from persecution in their home countries — can stay in custody for months or years while their cases are decided by an overburdened immigration court system....
Just the way the government likes it.
Are they really doing right by you, illegals?
"Suffolk jail is faulted in death of detainee; Immigrant faced deportation" by Maria Sacchetti, Globe Staff | July 30, 2010
Medical staff at the Suffolk County jail waited too long in October to send a feverish and trembling immigrant detainee to the hospital, allowing a deadly bacterial infection to overtake his body and cause his death of heart failure at age 49, according to a report by the federal immigration agency obtained by the Globe.
Pedro Tavarez, a Providence shuttle driver who was being held for deportation to the Dominican Republic, died Oct. 19 at a Boston hospital after a rapid decline that raised questions about medical care and government oversight at the Boston jail.
In Massachusetts?
Officials at the Suffolk County House of Correction have said that the infirmary, run by Tennessee-based Prison Health Services Inc., provides good care and has received high marks by reviewers.
Oh, ANOTHER PRIVATE CORPORATION in charge of the PRISON$!
But....
You knew that was coming.
Tavarez’s death highlighted longstanding concerns about the medical care of immigrant detainees, who are held in federal, local, and privately run jails across the country. In 2008, federal officials removed immigrants from the privately operated Wyatt Detention Facility in Central Falls, R.I., after a 34-year-old Chinese citizen was denied medical treatment shortly before he died of cancer.
Related: Rhode Island Cop Wants Gitmo Reopened
Also see: The Immigration Escort Service
Right into the grave!
The Obama administration is in line to deport around 400,000 immigrants this year, a number slightly higher than during the Bush administration, but federal officials have pledged to improve the detention system.
More change for the worse for those who voted for him.
In June, the head of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, John T. Morton, said seriously ill immigrants should not be jailed “absent extraordinary circumstances’’ or unless the law requires it.
Well, maybe they should be put in a hospital.
Advocates for immigrants have urged officials to reduce detentions, saying medical care lacks proper oversight from the federal government....
I think we could use that across the board in AmeriKa. Time to sort out who should be in there and who should not.
Tavarez, who had a daughter, came to the United States as a legal immigrant in 1976. He had three minor drug-related convictions, and an immigration judge ordered him deported in 1998.
He eluded authorities until April 2008, when Rhode Island State Police stopped him for a traffic violation and turned him over to ICE....
Related: Putting Rhode island on ICE
--more--"
I suppose that is one way to get out of jail.
:-(
How dare we lecture anyone on "human rights?"
