ICE is doing well in Austin

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-Austin has changed. People from ICE are always looking around, hoping someone picked up by the Travis County Sheriff or some other law enforcement officer - will turn out to be undocumented.
Interesting how Texas' most liberal city has turned into a police state.

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IMMIGRATION

More illegal immigrants are being charged criminally in Austin

Prison time comes before deportation for some.

By Steven Kreytak
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Wednesday, May 28, 2008

His mother had suffered a stroke, and his family needed money. So even though he had been deported once from the United States last year, Edgar Rodriguez-Sarmiento left his home in a rural Honduran village, paid a smuggler $2,000 to get him across the border and sought work while living in an Austin apartment off East Riverside Drive in January, according to court documents and his lawyer.

Six weeks later, Rodriguez was arrested on public intoxication charges and brought to the Travis County Jail. He was tagged by immigration agents and became enmeshed in a federal effort to charge even those with minor or no criminal history with the crime of re-entering the U.S. after deportation, a felony.

The effort, part of a nationwide crackdown on illegal immigration, has led to a surge in the number of undocumented immigrants in Austin who are being hit with a felony conviction, and sometimes sent to prison, before being deported.

The practice has been criticized by immigrant advocates and defense lawyers, who call it a waste of resources...

A recent report by Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse said the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency had filed 8,064 cases nationwide in February, a 43.8 percent increase compared with February 2007.

"There's a strong push to enforce the immigration laws and to be more aggressive," Sutton said. "Criminal illegal aliens are being prosecuted where maybe sometimes in the past they weren't."

Until two years ago, Sutton's office had a long-standing practice of prosecuting for illegal re-entry only immigrants who had previously committed an aggravated felony, such as rape, burglary or drug trafficking, or who had been deported and re-entered the country numerous times. The 2006 increase in cases against some immigrants with minor or no criminal histories appeared to be part of a national crackdown. But Sutton said at the time that there wouldn't be a sustained increase in those cases. There wasn't, until this year.

Adrian Ramirez, a San Antonio-based assistant field director for ICE's detention and removal division, said things changed in December or January after agency officials met with federal prosecutors in Washington. After that meeting, Ramirez said, agents were told to bring the cases of any immigrant who had been previously deported, even if they had no significant criminal history, to the U.S. attorney's office, which had agreed to prosecute them.

"They wanted a big push on that," Ramirez said. "Prosecution is a deterrent, especially for people who have already had an opportunity to be here, were deported and came back."

Ramirez oversees immigration agents who look for undocumented immigrants in prison and jails, including the Travis County Jail, where the increased presence of immigration agents this year has drawn protests in Austin.

ICE officials have said that from January 1 through March 31, the agency placed 763 immigration holds on inmates at the Travis County Jail — an almost 400 percent increase from the same period last year. That means that after the cases of those inmates are adjudicated, ICE is contacted to take possession of the person. Most are deported immediately, Ramirez said. The ones who have previously been deported are referred to the U.S. attorney's office, which prosecutes them in federal court...

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ICE and the Travis County Sheriff's Department

TRAVIS COUNTY
Sheriff defends allowing immigration officials to have office at jail
At public hearing, many in audience, one commissioner fear Hamilton pulling county into enforcement debate.
Listen to this article or download audio file.Click-2-Listen

By Marty Toohey
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Travis County Sheriff Greg Hamilton encountered sharp criticism and a smattering of support Tuesday for his decision to allow federal immigration agents to establish an office at the Travis County Jail.

At two public forums, Hamilton defended the decision, saying the sheriff's office is simply allowing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to use a side office in a jail in which its agents have been working for 30 years. He denied the charge that the sheriff's office is enforcing federal immigration law or facilitating racial profiling.

"I take offense to (critics) saying we're racial profiling," Hamilton said. "This is a public safety issue."

The immigration agency can detain people who have been arrested if it suspects that they are illegal immigrants, and the agency wants to have someone at the jail performing that vetting around the clock. The agency plans to add agents in Austin, and Hamilton said there was no harm in letting them use an office.

At the forums, some audience members disagreed.

"I think there's a great deal of naiveté in that statement," immigration attorney Malcolm Greenstein said at a night forumarranged to express community outrage. "It's a difference between an arm's-length relationship and embracing."

Among the concerns were questions of who would be detained — particularly if Hispanics would be the only ones — and whether people who would otherwise be let out were going to be kept behind bars while immigration agents vet them.

The main concern was that Hispanics could stop reporting crimes to the sheriff's office because of fears that deputies could begin arresting people accused of being in the country illegally.

"This undoes years of work by many people," said Joe Lopez, a member of Austin Interfaith.

About 120 people attended the night forum, including immigration attorneys and TV crews, but not officials from the immigration agency.

At a public hearing held earlier in the day by the county commissioners, some audience members said Hamilton was doing the right thing and should cooperate with federal officials.

"In many cases, these individuals (who are arrested) get a free pass to live here in our generous community and then commit crimes," audience member Brent Munhofen said.

That meeting was also heated at times.

When one audience member told the commissioners he was once a migrant worker, another audience member said loudly, "You're an illegal."

A third audience member said that was an unfair assumption and offered to settle the disagreement "outside on the street."

Commissioner Margaret Gómez chastised Hamilton for "getting defensive" and for not conferring with the commissioners before making a decision, later saying that Hamilton was creeping toward enforcing immigration law. The sheriff's office has a long-standing policy of not enforcing immigration law.

"I happen to think that no person from Earth is illegal," Gómez added.

Hamilton said Gómez was mischaracterizing the arrangement — "I don't know what part of the conversation you didn't hear" — and accused her of politicizing a law-enforcement issue.

mtoohey@statesman.com; 445-3673


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ICE settling in Travis (Austin) County Jail

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PUBLIC SAFETY

Sheriff to let federal immigration agents set up office in jail

Agents will look for undocumented immigrants

By Tony Plohetski

AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Saturday, January 26, 2008

Travis County Sheriff Greg Hamilton has agreed to let federal immigration agents set up an office in the county jail to more often monitor whether inmates booked into the downtown facility are legally in the United States.

Hamilton said this week that agents from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency will likely be stationed in the jail 24 hours a day, seven days a week in coming months. They began increasing their presence in the facility late last year.

Until recently, federal officials said agents only occasionally visited the jail to check the immigration status among inmates but sought more access from Hamilton.

The increased presence has led agents to double — if not triple — the number of "immigration holds" it has traditionally placed on Travis County inmates for possible deportation, said Adrian Ramirez, assistant field office director for the San Antonio office of the federal immigration agency, whose region includes Austin. Specific numbers were not available Friday. The inmates include anyone from undocumented immigrants accused of felony crimes to others who were arrested for Class C misdemeanor traffic violations, such as running a red light or not having a driver's licenses, officials said.

"I'm really shocked that Travis County is working with the immigration officials to help carry out immigration policies that need to be revised," said Rita Gonzales-Garza, a co-district director of the local chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens. "I would expect that of other counties, but it is unfortunate that it is occurring here."

Critics say that the increased enforcement could divide families in instances where a parent has U.S.-born children and affect the willingness of undocumented immigrants to work with local law enforcement officials to report and help solve crimes.

Hamilton, who met Thursday with concerned community groups, said he is only increasing the efficiency of federal immigration agents who have visited the jail looking for undocumented immigrants for at least two decades. He said his decision also is based on a belief that joint efforts between local and federal law enforcement agencies increase public safety.

"My contention is that the best way for (undocumented immigrants) to not come under scrutiny is to not commit crimes," Hamilton said.

Ramirez said agents since the 1980s have visited county jails across the nation to review forms that inmates fill out when they are booked into jail that ask their place of birth. They may request an interview with the inmates to determine whether they are legally in the United States.

Agents may place an immigration detainer on the inmates if they suspect they are undocumented immigrants.

Officials said such inmates generally remain in local jails until charges against them are resolved. From there they are moved to federal detention facilities, where their immigration cases are heard before a judge, who can order them to be deported. Ramirez said his region received federal money for more agents last June and that officials decided in October to focus their efforts in jails in Travis and Bexar counties, where they thought the number of undocumented immigrants was higher.

Ramirez said agents also are more frequently visiting jails throughout his 20-county region.

In Travis County, Ramirez said agents are trying to determine the immigration status of the 2,432 people already in jail. He said they plan to check the immigration status of new inmates when they are booked into jail.

Having an office in the Travis County Jail "is very important," he said. "In order for an officer to file a detainer, they have to interview that person. If we are there 24 hours a day, we can determine if the subject is removable. It is a lot easier."

In a four-page letter to Hamilton, attorney David Peek, whose clients include immigrants, said he is concerned about the number of inmates who will be forced to remain in jail and the cost to the county.

He said he also is worried that members of Austin's immigrant community will be afraid that interacting with local law enforcement officers could result in possible deportation.

Austin police have had a years-long practice of not questioning suspects or victims about their immigration status.

"This will have a wide-sweeping affect on the local economy, the community, untold businesses and the reputation which makes Austin great," the letter said.

tplohetski@statesman.com; 445-3605


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