Audits: ICE isn't cracking down on illegal immigrant employers

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7180760.html

Immigration inspectors poring over the hiring paperwork of a California company last summer found that 262 employees — a whopping 93 percent of the total workforce — had “suspect” documents on file.


At an Illinois service company, auditors found dubious documents for nearly 8 in 10 of its 200-plus employees.

Inspectors examining records at a Texas manufacturing firm found suspicious paperwork for more than half of the 107 employees on the payroll.

But the companies didn’t pay a penny in fines. None of the employers was led away in handcuffs. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials didn’t even issue them a formal warning, the agency’s internal records show.

Instead, they were instructed to purge their payrolls of illegal immigrants. Armed with assurances that the employees with suspect documents were fired — or, in the Texas case, “self-terminated” — the ICE auditors closed the cases.

The cases are just a few examples included in ICE’s internal records on its audit initiative, an enforcement program launched last July by Obama administration officials.

In the past, ICE had faced criticism for raiding job sites and rounding up large numbers of illegal immigrants for deportation, but not necessarily building cases against employers. With the audit initiative, ICE aims to scrutinize the hiring records of more businesses and impose what top officials describe as “tough” and “smart” employer sanctions.

But ICE audit records obtained recently through a Freedom of Information Act request show that the agency has, in many instances, failed to punish companies found to have significant numbers or high percentages of workers with questionable documents. In response to the public records request, ICE provided limited details on about 430 audit cases listed as “closed” by the agency through February.

The records show inspectors identified more than 110 companies with suspect documents, with nearly half of those having questionable paperwork for 10 or more workers.


No employers arrested

In total, the agency ordered 14 companies to pay fines of nearly $150,000, but noted no employer arrests in connection with any of the cases. ICE agents in Atlanta also reached an agreement with a manufacturing firm that had questionable records on file for 574 of its 1,187 employees. The agreement allowed the company to avoid criminal prosecution on the condition that it complies with certain ICE requirements, though ICE would not provide additional details.

ICE also has refused to disclose the names or locations of companies found through the auditing process to have hired illegal immigrants, saying the businesses have a right to “personal privacy.” The agency did, however, include the location of the ICE field office assigned to each case.

ICE officials insist the audits and the agency’s broader strategy of aggressively pursuing employers are getting results.


'You need evidence’

They point to the fact that this fiscal year the agency has ordered businesses to pay a record-setting $4.6 million in civil penalties and has arrested more than 150 employers, managers or supervisors. However, some of the arrests stem from investigations going back several years. And the fines reflect enforcement actions that date as far back as 2007, including $360,000 from the 2008 raid of a Houston rag factory and more than $536,000 from a 2007 Ohio chicken factory raid.

ICE did not have a breakdown of how much of the $4.6 million or how many of the arrests stemmed directly from the audit initiative, which began in July 2009.

Brett Dreyer, the head of ICE’s worksite enforcement unit, said that ICE attempts to determine which employers may have been duped into unintentionally accepting fraudulent documents from employees, and which ones are “turning a blind eye” to workers’ legal status.

“We look at each of these cases to see if they’re doing that, because that’s the main purpose of this program — check employers’ compliance and make sure that they’re obeying the law,” Dreyer said. “But you need evidence. You need facts. And if we don’t have that, we can’t charge them.”


Several gray areas

Immigration experts said some cases that seem egregious on the surface, like the company with 93 percent of its workers providing suspect documents, may actually have complied with the letter of the law and not be subject to penalties.

“You could have a vast majority of workers ultimately be found to be in undocumented status and yet still have a good faith employer simply because of the way the system works,” said Charles Foster, a Houston immigration attorney who specializes in employer compliance.

Foster said an employer cannot require more than a Social Security card that looks “reasonably genuine” on its face, or he risks committing an unfair employment practice.


Cost of doing business

In July 2009, ICE officials announced plans to serve 654 companies with notice of plans to audit their employment paperwork. In November, ICE announced plans to target an additional 1,000 companies.

In the two rounds of audits, inspectors examined more than 221,000 I-9 forms and identified 22,155 “suspect documents,” which can signal an employee is in the country illegally and lacks work authorization, or that the employer made a simple clerical error on the forms, ICE officials said.

But critics charge that ICE’s new strategy is soft on both illegal immigrants, who generally are not placed into deportation proceedings, and employers who can claim ignorance about fake documents and avoid penalties.

U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio, said the audits can be an effective part of an overall enforcement strategy, but that many employers consider them just a cost of doing business.

“They are not an effective deterrent on their own, and do nothing to bring justice in egregious cases,” Smith said.

Immigrant advocates estimated the audits, frequently referred to as “silent raids,” have cost thousands of workers their jobs. Angela Kelley, with the Center for American Progress, said the strategy appears to be more thoughtful than the worksite enforcement raids of the previous administration, but the impact is “equally as devastating.”

“You have this drip, drip, drip of I-9 enforcement audits all over the country, and it has the same effect — people don’t come to work the next day,” she said.

susan.carroll@chron.com

Illegal immigrant who killed nun in accident was released by feds

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/aug/2/illegal-immigrant-killed-nun-released-by-feds/

UPDATED:


The Virginia man suspected in a drunken-driving crash that killed a Catholic nun in Prince William County this weekend is an illegal immigrant and repeat offender who was awaiting deportation and whom federal immigration authorities had released pending further proceedings, police said Monday.

Carlos Montano, a county resident, has been charged with involuntary manslaughter and drunken driving. Mr. Montano had been arrested two other times on drunken-driving charges, and on at least one of those occasions county police reported him to federal authorities.

"We have determined that he is in the country illegally. He has been arrested by Prince William County Police in the past, said police spokesman Jonathan Perok.

He said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement was notified at the time of one of those arrests. "At the time of this incident, the accident yesterday, he was in the deportation process and was out on his recognizance for court proceedings."

The crash at around 8:30 Sunday morning killed Sister Denise Mosier and injured two other nuns as they were driving to a retreat at the Benedictine Monastery in Bristow, Va. The two injured nuns were in critical but stable condition late Monday, according to St. Gertrude High School in Richmond run by the Benedictine Sisters of Virginia.

Mr. Montano was being treated for injuries he received in the crash and was expected to be released from the hospital into police custody as early as Monday evening.

Messages left with ICE and the Homeland Security Department were not returned, but the incident raises questions about the agency's policy of detaining only some illegal immigrants awaiting deportation.

"I have been saying for months now that this administration's new policy of concentrating almost solely on 'criminal aliens,' and not enforcing the laws by deporting known illegal aliens, would have devastating consequences. Now, we see the tragic results this 'virtual amnesty' policy of the Obama administration has caused," said Rep. Harold Rogers of Kentucky, the ranking Republican on the House Appropriations homeland security subcommittee.

Mexican Drug Cartel Allegedly Puts a Price on Arizona Sheriff's Head

http://www.myfoxphoenix.com/dpp/news/immigration/mexican-drug-cartel-sheriff-arpaio-07292010

$1M offered for Arpaio, $1K to join cartel

PHOENIX - He's been at the center of the discussions and controversies surrounding illegal immigration enforcement in Arizona for quite a while.


On the day parts of Arizona's immigration law, SB 1070, went into effect, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is in the news for another reason: there's a price on his head - allegedly offered by a Mexican drug cartel.

The audio message in Spanish is a bit garbled, but the text is clear.

It's offering $1 million for Sheriff Joe Arpaio's head and $10,000 for anyone who wants to join the Mexican cartel.

A man who wants to remain anonymous says his wife received the text message Tuesday evening. It also included an international phone number and instructions to pass the message along.

"She showed it to me..I was kind of disgusted..I reported it to the Sheriff's department yesterday..they said they were going to direct the threat squad on it."

Lisa Allen of the Sheriff's office says they believe the message originated in Mexico.

Although the Sheriff has received numerous death threats in the past, they believe this threat is credible because of its timing.

"Arpaio gets threats pretty routinely, but obviously with this heightened awareness of his role in the immigration issue we've got to take this one a little bit more seriously with a million dollar contract out on him," said Allen.

But she says what really concerns investigators is how quickly the message may have been spread. "It's going so many different places that our folks are looking at it and thinking well at any given point in time it could land in front of some crazy person who thinks I can do that."

As for Arpaio's reaction to the threat, "It's a little bit like water off a duck's back for him, but you never know if it's that sense of false bravado with him..you just can't read it, I'm sure he's concerned, I'm sure he's concerned for his family more than anything else," said Allen.

The Sheriff's office says investigators are trying to trace exactly where the text message came from, but because it did originate from an international number, that will be difficult too.

http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/25983

ONLY the US Supreme Court has Constitutional Authority to Conduct the Trial


By Publius Huldah Thursday, July 29, 2010

Does anyone read the U.S. Constitution these days? American lawyers don’t read it. Federal Judge Susan R. Bolton apparently has never read it. Same goes for our illustrious Attorney General Eric Holder. But this lawyer has read it and she is going to show you something in Our Constitution which is as plain as the nose on your face.

Article III, Sec. 2, clause 2 says:

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction.

Arizona Immigration Law Castrated

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/07/28/federal-judge-rules-arizona-immigration-law-dispute/

A federal judge on Wednesday blocked some of the toughest provisions in the Arizona illegal immigration law, putting on hold the state's attempt to have local police enforce federal immigration policy.
Though the rest of the law is still set to go into effect Thursday, the partial injunction on SB 1070 means Arizona, for the time being, will not be able to require police officers to determine the immigration status of anyone they stop or arrest.
U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton also struck down the section of law that makes it a crime not to carry immigration registration papers and the provision that makes it a crime for an illegal immigrant to seek or perform work.

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, reacting to the ruling, said the "fight is far from over" and vowed to take the case "all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary."

"The bottom line is we've known all along that it is the responsibility of the feds," Brewer told The Associated Press. "They haven't done their job so we were going to help them do that."


The Mexican government praised the judge's decision. Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa told reporters that the injunction was a "first step in the right direction."

In all, Bolton struck down four sections of the law, the ones that opponents called the most controversial. Bolton said she was putting those sections on hold until the courts resolve the issues.

The ruling said the Obama administration, which sought the injunction, is likely to "succeed on the merits" in showing the above provisions are preempted by federal law.

"The court by no means disregards Arizona's interests in controlling illegal immigration and addressing the concurrent problems with crime including the trafficking of humans, drugs, guns, and money," the ruling said. "Even though Arizona's interests may be consistent with those of the federal government, it is not in the public interest for Arizona to enforce preempted laws."

A number of provisions will still go into effect as the case is litigated. Arizona will be able to block state officials from so-called "sanctuary city" policies limiting enforcement of federal law; require that state officials work with federal officials on illegal immigration; allow civil suits over sanctuary cities; and make it a crime to pick up day laborers.

The ruling came just as police were making last-minute preparations to begin enforcement of the law and protesters were planning large demonstrations to speak out against the measure. At least one group planned to block access to federal offices, daring officers to ask them about their immigration status.

Justice Department spokeswoman Hannah August said the court "ruled correctly" with its decision Wednesday.

"While we understand the frustration of Arizonans with the broken immigration system, a patchwork of state and local policies would seriously disrupt federal immigration enforcement and would ultimately be counterproductive," August said.

The Department of Homeland Security released a statement saying the decision "affirms the federal government's responsibilities" to enforce immigration law. The department claimed "unprecedented resources" have been devoted to that effort.

Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., one of the most vocal advocates on immigration issues on Capitol Hill, applauded the decision.

"Arresting people based on their appearance and holding them until you can investigate their immigration status is patently un-American and unconstitutional," he said.

But supporters of the policy slammed the court's decision.

"This fight is far from over. In fact, it is just the beginning, and at the end of what is certain to be a long legal struggle, Arizona will prevail in its right to protect our citizens," Brewer said.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., called the ruling "misguided."

"The federal government has a right and a responsibility to enforce existing laws, but when they fail to meet that responsibility, we should not stand in the way of the states that take action to respond to the very real threat of border violence, drug cartels and human smuggling," he said in a written statement. "There's nowhere in the Constitution that says a state is limited to what it absolutely won't do and can be stopped for what it might do and to exercise a judgment against a state that has passed a law that is consistent with existing federal law is beyond absurd."

The volume of the protests will likely be turned down a few notches because of the ruling by Bolton, a Clinton appointee who suddenly became a crucial figure in the immigration debate when she was assigned the seven lawsuits filed against the Arizona law.

Lawyers for the state contend the law was a constitutionally sound attempt by Arizona -- the busiest illegal gateway into the country -- to assist federal immigration agents and lessen border woes such as the heavy costs for educating, jailing and providing health care for illegal immigrants.

Opponents argued the law will lead to racial profiling, conflict with federal immigration law and distract local police from fighting more serious crimes. The U.S. Justice Department, civil rights groups and a Phoenix police officer had asked the judge for an injunction to prevent the law from being enforced.

Localities inside Arizona were already preparing to interpret the law in different ways. The Tucson Unified School District's Governing Board approved by a 5-0 vote a policy Tuesday that maintains the district's stance of not enforcing immigration laws in the district's schools.

The hardest-line approach was expected in the Phoenix area, where Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio plans his 17th crime and immigration sweep. He planned to hold the sweep regardless of the ruling.

Arpaio, known for his tough stance against illegal immigration, plans to send out about 200 deputies and volunteers who will be looking for traffic violators, people wanted on criminal warrants and others. He has used that tactic before to arrest dozens of people, many of them illegal immigrants.

"We don't wait. We just do it," he said. "If there's a new law out, we're going to enforce it."

Elsewhere in the state, police officials were busy wrapping up training sessions this week. Many of the state's 15,000 police officers have been watching a DVD released this month that signs that might indicate a person is an illegal immigrant are speaking poor English, looking nervous or traveling in an overcrowded vehicle. It warned that race and ethnicity do not.

Some agencies added extra materials, including a test, a role-playing exercise or a question-and-answer session with prosecutors.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

I hope they ask this asshole for his papers if he shows his face in Arizona

Arizona immigration law may prompt influx of immigrants into Texas, professor says

http://www.examiner.com/x-37614-Austin-Market-Examiner~y2010m4d23-Arizona-immigration-law-may-prompt-influx-of-immigrants-into-Texas-professor-says

New immigration bill puts local police on front line of border battle

http://www.azfamily.com/news/New-bill-puts-local-police-on-front-line-of-border-battle-90805259.html

Are republicans finally hearing us on immigration?

Houston+sheriffs+round+up+thousands+of+illegals+-+Washington+Times

Houston+sheriffs+round+up+thousands+of+illegals+-+Washington+Times

Kudos to Houston Sherrif's Department!

I can't wrap my head around the opposition's thought process on this one. Illegal aliens will be scared to report crimes? They're scared anyway because they are here ILLEGALY! I don't care if the cop stopped him for j-walking or littering, if he's defying our immigration laws, he's breaking the law, making him a criminal. We have laws against this stuff for a reason, j-walking, littering, and illegal immigration. All of these activities do nothing good for our community.