Catch and Release is Live and Well for ICE

It seems differences in opinion and the law between local law enforcement and US Border Patrol Agents have allowed illegal aliens to go free.

Maricopa County Jail inmates convicted or cleared of human-smuggling charges and presumed to be undocumented ILLEGAL ALIENS [Emphasis mine - sanity] were allowed to walk out of jail without being removed from the country because of a spat over jurisdiction between the Sheriff's Office and federal immigration agents.

Hello?

Anyone in the federal government not have their head up their rear ends?

Your allowing illegal aliens to walk free on American soil, even after they have been caught by local law enforcement, because of jurisdiction?!?!?

Would it matter any if any of them were, say a terrorist? Would jurisdiction be a problem then?
Would you endanger American lives because of jurisdiction?
Would you allow them to walk freely away after being caught by local law enforcement, because of jurisdiction issues?

Could you be that pathetic?

I am not saying every illegal alien coming over the border is a terrorist, not by far, but we need to treat this like they could be.

The US has gotten complacent again, 911 is on many minds, but seems to have been forgotten, especially on how easily the terrorist got in, stayed in, got by and around our own laws.

We are fools and our government is acting very foolish right now.
This is petty and rediculous.
If your going to protect the borders, then do so CONSISTENTLY.

This may not seem right, but I say treat every illegal alien coming into America as a potential terrorist.

The possibility exists, it is there, we have already had reports of catching some terrorists coming across our southern border. Unfortunately it barely gets noticed, because we might encroach on the rights of illegal aliens illegally entering into our country. Rights?!?!

You have the right to be deported to the country of your origin.
You have the right to be treated fairly, fed and given humanitarian aid before being removed from our shores.
You have the right to ask for asylum from hardship or war torn areas.
You have the right to go through the process of LEGAL immigration into our country like everyone else.

These are the rights I think they should have.

Since the first arrests made under Arizona's human-smuggling law in March, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office has filed 268 cases, 31 against suspected coyotes and the rest against suspected conspirators assumed to be undocumented immigrants.

So far, 63 have pleaded guilty to lesser offenses, 15 have been dismissed, two acquitted and one convicted by a jury.

But 17 have walked right out of the jail and into the community - including six who pleaded guilty to human-smuggling felonies - because the U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency decided it wouldn't transport out of the country people prosecuted under the controversial coyote law.

Instead, they slipped unnoticed through the red tape of a giant jail system and onto the streets.

First of all it is not up to Immigration whether they will transport those convicted under a "controversial" law, that is up to the courts, and the supreme court to determine if a law is legal or not. It is not up to Immigration to make that determination.

These illegal aliens have been convicted, or found to be here illegally, and should be deported.

"Why would they refuse to pick up the felons?" Sheriff Joe Arpaio asked.

Exactly. Why would you refuse to pick up felons?
Why would you allow them back onto American Soil, on to American streets?

Because, according to an ICE spokesman, only federal agents with ICE, the Border Patrol and other U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials are legally empowered to determine who is a citizen and who is in the country legally, which they do through specific interviews and checks.

"An officer must base the determination of status upon either an interview of the subject or through fingerprint comparison with existing records," ICE Special Agent in Charge Roberto Medina said in a July 6 letter to Arpaio. "Furthermore, only federal officers . . . can place detainers pursuant to the (Immigration and Nationality Act)."

State and county law enforcement can't make such determinations about "alienage."

Then make that determination when you receive the felons. Why would you release them?
Why would you refuse to even accept them?

Law enforcement does YOUR JOB, and then turns them over to you, and your continue to not do your job by not even accepting them, not running them through the process? You say they are not allowed to make that determination, that only ICE or Federal is allowed. Well, they have turned them over to your custody, MAKE THE DAMN DETERMINATION THEN!!!

Yes, this is very frustrating to me.
Our government officials and agencies don't seem to be doing their damn jobs and hampering or making it extremely difficult when local enforcement decided to do it for them.

Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas was distressed.

"ICE's refusal to pick up and deport acknowledged illegal immigrants arrested by local law enforcement shows that the federal policy of 'catch and release' is still the order of the day," he said. "The federal government's continued unwillingness to perform its basic duty of securing our border makes Arizona's human-smuggling law all the more important."

According to the Sheriff's Office, there are an average of 900 to 1,000 prisoners in the jail at any one time with immigration detainers, or holds, indicating that ICE is to be contacted before they can be released.

I really wish our government would treat our borders and the protection of our borders as seriously as they do the war on terrorism. In all actuality this should be a part of that war, because the possibility of terrorist coming across our southern border is very great.

When suspects are booked into Maricopa County jails, they are questioned on their immigration status. And if the interviewing officers doubt the suspect's immigration status, they send a teletyped message to ICE, which responds with its decision of whether to place a detainer on that suspect after running the information through its databanks.

Arpaio claimed that 35 of the suspects charged with human-smuggling violations had immigration holds that were later removed.

The reasoning for dropping the holds, according to Medina's letter, was that even though the suspects were being held on suspicion of human smuggling, which presupposes they are here illegally, ICE officials determined their interviews had not been conducted by qualified ICE personnel.

"In which case it should be incumbent on them to do an interview," said MCSO Chief Michael Olson, who is in charge of the jails.

Instead, as the charges were dropped, or as the convicts were sentenced to probation, they were released by deputies because there were no holds against them.

The lapse was discovered June 11 when a judge acquitted two men of conspiracy to commit smuggling and MCSO personnel called to have them transported from the jail.

When ICE refused, Arpaio announced he would have his own deputies do the transport.

"Now we have to waste our manpower," Arpaio said. "I don't have to do this. I can just let them go on the street. Who cares? Because they're convicted felons. They deserve to go back to Mexico because a judge said they're going back to Mexico. He didn't say how."

Link
A judge convicts them and says they should go back to Mexico....
Local law enforcemnt contacts ICE to set that up.
ICE says, nope, not going to do it.

WHY?!?!?
Do your damn jobs.
If you can't do your jobs perhaps we as Americans need to look at finding a way to replace these people with individuals that will do their jobs.

It is bad enough Immigration is so overwhelmed, I can understand that. But when local law enforcemnt is helping, they are doing YOUR JOB for you, and yet you cannot even make the effort to finish the process, do an interview, make a determination or transport them back across the border....it is really sickening!


Maybe we need to replace everyone in ICE with Mexicans, I hear they are doing the jobs that Americans don't or won't do.....