E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSSThe Etowah County Detention Center in Gadsden, Ala., holds as many as 350 suspected undocumented immigrants for open-ended stays as they await deportation. Critics say conditions in the rural lockup are "inhumane." NBC's Mark Potter reports.
GADSDEN, Ala. -- Ivan Stobert was in many ways the ideal immigrant.
In 2006, he traveled from Moldova to the United States on a visa. While here, he fell in love and in 2008 married a U.S. citizen. He became a permanent legal resident, bought a house in the Atlanta area and started a cleaning business.
Hannah Rappleye/NBC News
Ivan Stobert, a 25 year-old Moldovan national, speaks to his lawyer from his home in Atlanta. Despite holding a green card, he says he spent nearly a year in the Etowah County Detention Center last fall after accidentally checking the "U.S. citizen" box on a motorcycle license application.
“Finally I made my dream,” Stobert told NBC News. “I buy my house, I have my business. I thought, ‘Wow, I love America!’”
But the love affair ended in December 2010, when the slight 25-year-old found himself locked up indefinitely in the Etowah County Detention Center in northeast Alabama, charged with an aggravated felony and facing deportation.
More than 250 detention facilities around the country are used to hold the tens of thousands immigrants detained each year by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE, as they await court dates or deportation. Even those accused of relatively minor infractions, such as overstaying a visa, can be held for months – or even years – fighting their cases without the benefit of rights and resources guaranteed to those accused of criminal acts.
Immigrant advocates have for years called Etowah one of the worst facilities in ICE’s sprawling detention system.
In late July, conditions in the isolated facility, which also serves as the county jail, prompted some immigration detainees to refuse food in an act of protest to demand better treatment. A hundred detainees signed a letter to ICE and operators of the jail.
“Some Detainees life’s (sic) are at stake and to disregard this fact is inhumane and not in compliance with ICE (standards),” they wrote.
“They were sending us rotten food, food that’s spoiled,” detainee Javian Lawrence, a 27-year-old Jamaican national, told NBC News in a phone interview from the jail.
Those detained in Etowah are locked up for myriad reasons -- including overstayed visas or entering the country illegally. But others, like Stobert, say they were caught in the immigration law enforcement web by mistake.
Checking the wrong box
Stobert says his troubles began in April 2009 when he accidentally checked the “U.S. Citizen” box on a motorcycle license application. He said that even though he presented his green card and Moldovan passport along with the application, indicating he was in the country legally, two law enforcement officers arrived at his home more than a year and a half later and arrested him for providing false statements on a government application. He was booked into jail in Atlanta, held for more than a month, then transferred to Etowah.
For what he says was an innocent mistake, Stobert spent nearly a year behind bars. And while he was locked up, he says, he lost his house to foreclosure, his wife left him and his budding cleaning business collapsed.
Source: TRAC at Syracuse University/ICE
Chart shows the number of immigrant detainees held by U.S. authorities by year. * = projected figures.
“I lost everything while I been there,” he said. “I lost my house. I lost my wife. I lost all my cars, whatever I had. I lost everything.”Though his case was dismissed, a hearing on his immigration status is still pending and he remains unsure of whether he’ll be deported or–even worse, from his perspective–locked up again. “I’m not sure,” he said, “if America will keep me or not.”
Locked up in limbo
After scandals including sexual abuse by guards, deaths in custody and the detention of children, ICE announced in August 2009 plans to consolidate its network of detention centers, many of them county jails, and improve oversight.
Three years later, however, the agency still houses nearly 34,000 immigration detainees on any given day in some facilities that critics say are intended to be short-term way stations in the criminal justice system, not used for long-term civil detention.
Many of the more than 300 men at the Etowah County Detention Center – who spend much of their time in cramped cells, denied access to the outdoors – face open-ended stays in the jail. They include asylum seekers; immigrants fighting deportation or petitioning for special status that would enable them to remain in the U.S.; immigrants from countries unwilling to take them back; and people without the proper paperwork to be repatriated.
ICE’s decision to hold long-term detainees in the Alabama jail is rooted in cost-savings: At just $40 a day per detainee, Etowah has one of the lowest rates of any ICE detention facility in the country.
Floyd Abdul, a Zimbabwean national, describes the four months he spent locked up in Alabama's Etowah County Detention Center.
But it also has its challenges. At the end of 2010, ICE attempted to terminate its use of the facility, citing a number of factors, including expensive transportation costs to and from court, and lack of access to ICE staff and attorneys. Its remoteness also makes it difficult for lawyers and the detainees’ family members to visit.
But money from ICE has become an essential source of revenue to the county, bringing in about $5 million a year that funds a host of programs and services in the community. Losing that revenue would be a “devastating blow” to the budget, Etowah Sheriff Todd Entrekin told the Gadsden Times in 2011.
After a political fight to keep the detainees there, the facility came under the control of ICE’s New Orleans field office. About 100 female detainees once housed at Etowah were moved out. New Orleans now uses the 350 beds Etowah reserves for ICE to house male detainees, almost all of whom ICE expects to linger in the system.
Both ICE and Etowah County officials declined repeated requests by NBC News to speak on camera. But advocates for the detainees object to using a jail like Etowah to detain immigrants for the long term.
"It’s absolutely inhumane,” said H. Glenn Fogle, an Atlanta-based immigration attorney who represented Stobert and others detained in the jail. “If you hold somebody long term they’re supposed to go to a proper jail, a long-term jail facility where they can go outside. In these short term facilities you can’t. You’re basically in a jail cell 80 to 90 percent of the time.”
Detainees currently are held at Etowah an average of 49 days, records show. Yet some, like Stobert, remain far longer.
Challenging deportation
Immigrants face major barriers to challenging their detention and deportation, in part because they operate in a civil, rather than criminal, system. To sneak across the border is a crime, but to overstay a visa – one of the most common ways that people lose legal status – is a legal infraction akin to a moving violation.
But due to the civil nature of the crime, immigrants caught in the deportation process have fewer legal protections than someone accused of murder. They lack the right to representation, a speedy trial, double jeopardy protections or standard habeas corpus.
A report by the Vera Institute of Justice found that between 2006 and 2007, more than 80 percent of detained immigrants fought their cases without a lawyer. Stobert was one of the lucky few who could afford one.
Hannah Rappleye/NBC News
Immigration lawyer H. Glenn Fogle at his office in Atlanta.
Even so, in April 2011, an Atlanta immigration judge ordered Stobert’s deportation, claiming he had intentionally checked the U.S. citizen box. Stobert, already locked up for over five months, decided to fight and his lawyer appealed. He applied to be released on bond, which would include supervision that costs much less than detention. The motion was denied. Fogle, Stobert’s attorney, said he believes ICE keeps people in Etowah so that detainees will give up hope.
“People have legitimate cases to stay here in the United States, but if they give up and their spirit is broken in these detention centers they’re just going to sign” their deportation papers, he said. “And that’s not right.”
‘Undeportable’
Many of the detainees in Etowah have complicated cases, stemming from criminal charges or diplomatic intricacies. Even some willing to be voluntarily deported cannot be. Countries like China, Cuba or certain Caribbean Islands regularly rebuff U.S. efforts to return their citizens.
Immigration detainees have constitutional protections against indefinite detention. In 2001 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled ICE has approximately six months to deport or release immigrants after their case is decided.
ICE can, however, hold people longer if it can show that certain special circumstances apply – such as the detainee posing a terrorism risk – or if it can show an immigrant will be deported in the near future. But ICE records show the agency regularly opposes even the release of detainees who it has struggled to deport, and prevails.
Barbados national Hanson Marshall, 35, for example, has been detained by ICE for 23 months. He spent time in detention centers in five states before arriving at Etowah last June.
Marshall, who wears the green shirt that at Etowah signals he’s considered a medium-risk detainee, came to the United States legally when he was 16 and settled in Brooklyn with his family. His visa expired, but he stayed.
Marshall had tangled with the law. In 2003, he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge for possessing a firearm. In 2010, he was picked up in New York City on a warrant for a misdemeanor. He spend a week in jail. The day he was to be released, he was instead transferred into ICE custody.
ICE has switched tactics in recent years, concentrating on deporting more immigrants facing criminal charges, like Marshall. But in his case, the deportation has become a Catch-22: Until Barbados issues the necessary travel documents, the United States can’t send him home.
“I would be more than pleased to go back to Barbados but I can’t make it happen,” said Marshall. “It’s not up to me. It’s up to the consulate. But if you stay in immigration for a period of time, and they can’t acquire travel documents, then I shouldn’t have to sit up in jail for the rest of my life.”
Inside Etowah
ICE, which operates the largest detention system in the U.S., relies heavily on jails like Etowah to detain immigrants. Critics have argued for years that jails are not appropriate for ICE detainees, because they live as prisoners -- wearing uniforms, confined in small cells and forced to mingle with general inmate populations.
Hannah Rappleye/NBC News
The Etowah County Detention Center in Gadsden, Ala.
ICE, too, has emphasized that detention is not meant to be punishment.
“We’re not a penal institution,” John Morton, director of ICE, in a 2010 speech at the Migration Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C.,-based think tank. “We detain people for purposes of removal. We detain people because if we release them they would pose a danger to people or run away. We’re not incarcerating anyone.”
On a tour of the Etowah County Detention Center in May by NBC News, ICE detainees in Unit 10 crowded to the door of the glassed-in recreation area to speak with reporters. Men from countries like Sierra Leone, Morocco, Poland and Guatemala shouted to be heard while other detainees worked out in the room behind, lifting weights and doing pull-ups on metal bars.
The rec room in each unit provides the detainees with their only exposure to natural light or open air, both of which come through a narrow grating high on one wall. Otherwise, detainees go outdoors only when bused to court proceedings, for emergency medical care or when taken to the airport to be deported.
The facility that houses the detainees is by most appearances a jail. Two levels of cells line the large rectangular units. Detainees eat at tables in the middle of the pod, and bunk in small cells behind heavy doors. Mattresses are thin, the showers are bare and public.
Like the rest of the jail’s inmates, the immigrants are not allowed contact visits with family or friends, except under special circumstances. Visitation takes place via a video screen. Detainees interviewed said the no-contact policy discouraged their spouses, children and friends from driving hours to see them.
Detainees also said the commissary, where they can purchase extra food or toiletries, is prohibitively expensive. Phone calls, often the single link to families sometimes thousands of miles away, can cost up to $1 per minute.
Hannah Rappleye/NBC News
An immigration detainee writes in his cell at the Etowah County Detention Center.
Immigration lawyers, and courts, are also difficult to access from Etowah. Many detainees described inadequate medical care, although the detention center operates a clinic with a full-time nurse and weekly visits from a doctor.
ICE’s own reports have noted deficiencies. A 2008 inspection report noted two suicides by county inmates within a six month period. ICE records from that year also indicate that a female detainee tried to hang herself in her cell. The food supply was the subject of a grand jury investigation in 2010. Jurors concluded it was sufficient.
Since coming under control of the New Orleans Field Office, ICE detention monitors have worked “worked hand-in-hand with facility staff to address these issues and work to implement corrective where necessary,” ICE spokeswoman Gillian Christensen wrote in January 2012 in response to a query about conditions.
Passed inspections
Human rights monitors from the Women’s Refugee Commission also indicate Etowah has made steps to improve the facility, but a recent report from the group indicated problems persist, including complaints about food. The human rights group said the county had been addressing some of the concerns raised in the report.
During the visit by NBC News in May, the menu listed meals with beans, tortillas, fruit, hot dogs, and hamburgers. But Stobert and other former and current detainees said such improvements were recent.
Also new are some niceties in the units at Etowah that house the immigrants, who were recently allowed to participate in programs formerly available only to county inmates. The wall of one, for example, is adorned with a painted mural of the world. There also are fish tanks in each unit. Officials have also implemented programs for detainees and improved access to medical care, among other reforms.
According to an ICE spokesperson, inspectors found no violations during the facility’s most recent review. Etowah County is currently soliciting bids to build an outdoor recreation center on top of the jail in order to bring the facility up to ICE’s most recent standards, which would also increase pay for officers who oversee ICE detainees.
In May, a detainee in Unit 4, which holds those with the lowest risk classification, was training a dog as part of a new Puppies Without Borders program, intended as an “outlet to relieve the stress of being detained.” The man, a native of the Philippines who declined to give his name, said he was being held while he awaited a decision on his petition for a U-Visa, a special visa offered to immigrants who have been victims of a crime. Smiling as the puppy scurried across the catwalk, he said Etowah was far better than the ICE jail in Illinois that he was transferred from.
“This is like heaven,” he said of Etowah. “The other was like hell.”
But by July, when detainees staged a brief hunger strike, many complained that the facility had reverted back to some of its old ways, serving food that was rotten and nutritionally inadequate.
“The situation has not been resolved,” detainee Anthony Orlando Williams said in a phone interview from the facility, where he has spent nearly three years because he has no official country of origin to which the U.S. can deport him. “It’s just been tolerated.”
Following the protest, detainees in Unit 9 were on lockdown, held for nearly 22 hours a day in their cells, according to detainees and their advocates. Nonetheless, they say the strike may just be the first in a series of actions aimed at forcing ICE to move them out of Etowah.
“It’s hit a fever pitch,” said Abraham Paulos, executive director of Families for Freedom, an immigrant rights group that has been tracking conditions at Etowah. “We’ve never seen a demand of leaving Etowah. They don’t care if they’re still detained, they just don’t want to be detained in Etowah.”
Read Part 2: When ICE sought to shutter immigration jail, politics intervened.
Leave a Comment:
Homeland security is getting so bad in the united states that they are stopping white canadians and hassling them at the borders. I used to go to the states quite alot bought tons of merchandise las vegas disney land even was going to buy a house in palm springs. But now travel everywhere but the U.S no hassles countries eager for my tourist dollars. Im sorry if you had 911 happen but white canadians are not arab and im not a muslim.
Were you staying without wanting to become a US citizen? Did you have all of your paper work done? If you are just visiting - no problem.
so being "white" should be a pass to go ahead of the line? How was is tha the 911 terrorist came into our country? Oh yeah your beloved canada. Terrorism has no color, so keep your color blind canadain a$$ up there.
Another sob story from MSNBC trying to garner sympathy for crimminals. I frankly don't care what happens to them, or how long they have to stay locked up. They're breaking our laws and should pay a price for it.
TOM MARVOLO....i agree with you,if you got here illegally then you did brake the law. i can see why some countries do not want the thugs back. its all about doing it legally!
SEMPER FI
DANNY P
RETIRED
Only In America ... The Land Of The Free? ..... LOL Bull@!$%#! ... we are turning into a fascist state right before our eyes ... and most are to complainant to even notice ..
Next we will be called the land of the "Sheeple!"
So a guy get's locked up for an honest mistake of checking the wrong box. Why? The system is overwhelmed with all the illegals it has to deal with. Lawyers trying to sue the government....this whole situation is a joke. Why?
Because if the government were doing it's job in the first place, that is fining and jailing every scum bag who hires an illegal, there would be no jobs for the illegals. They would self deport and they would stop coming here in the first place because there would no incentive. Then we tax payers wouldn't have to pay for the stupid detention centers and ICE and Border Patrol agents could focus on all the criminals coming across the border.
Pathetic situation compliments of all the politicians in DC who are so worried about votes they would rather ignore their oath of office.
Sheeeesh, another Immigration article to support Mr. Obma's OPENING the borders and reducing border security and border agents IF he is re-elected for a 2nd term. Check out his "PLANS" if he is re-elected.
This is all about Mr. Obama's vision of his BIG immigration reform plan.....NOTHING.....just let the Illegal Aliens (Immigrants) cross the border.
I'm sure Mr.Stobert knew the immigration laws as most of the illegals likely do. In one part of the story it says he had his citizenship in another part it says he didn't. Just because you marry an American doesn't make citizenship automatic. When my mother came here from England she still had to go through the process. Apparently Mr. Stobert didn't and got caught in a lie on his motorcycle license. Tough! As for complaining about the detainment system he should count his lucky stars he wasn't thrown into a mexican jail. I don't understand the nerve of these people to knowingly come here illegally, get caught and then complain about it. If conditions are that bad in Mexico maybe they should start a revolution and change their system instead of coming here.
My wife was from another country and we did the work right. This guy messed up and got in trouble with the law, that is automatic disqualification and to add he was past his visa. You know nothing about the process and like the rest of the bleading heart lemmings out there eat this crap up. It took my wife and I to go from nothing to full blown US Citizen and have friends that have done the same. These people who cry bloody murder at the process are full of @!$%#. It is extremely easy and if you don't have the time "check the correct box" when you are doing your paperwork then you deserve what you get. To easy to blame others and the system when its your own patetic fault. We are both very supportive of upholding the laws as it stands... We keep lowering the bar enough our country.... This crap needs to stop.
That doesn't make sense. If legals took the jobs there would be no jobs for illegals, why get the government involved?
On it...scroll down and read Lisa's comment #9.1 below.
"So a guy get's locked up for an honest mistake of checking the wrong box. Why? The system is overwhelmed with all the illegals it has to deal with. Lawyers trying to sue the government....this whole situation is a joke. Why?
Because if the government were doing it's job in the first place, that is fining and jailing every scum bag who hires an illegal, there would be no jobs for the illegals. They would self deport and they would stop coming here in the first place because there would no incentive. Then we tax payers wouldn't have to pay for the stupid detention centers and ICE and Border Patrol agents could focus on all the criminals coming across the border.
Pathetic situation compliments of all the politicians in DC who are so worried about votes they would rather ignore their oath of office."
Like the drug trade argument that if there weren't people making the drugs, there would be none to buy. But a lot of people fail to understand that if there aren't people buying the drugs, there will be no one to make it.
Same thing applies here. If there aren't any Illegal immigrants to begin with, business owners couldn't hire them. It'll only work the way you mentioned if we get rid of (just throwing a high number out here) 90 percent of the illegal immigrants all ready here. And then, yes, buffing up border patrol. We could take the thousands of soldiers who are coming back home from Iraq and Afghanistan and give them a job.
I'm not saying we shouldn't fine business owners for hiring illegal immigrants. I'm just saying that it isn't the only answer. I think that's what you were saying after that, but I was just clearing it up for everyone else.
And if you had bothered to actually read the article you had decided to offer your expert opinion on, you would have found out that these detained people are not criminals. Nor crimminals.
No, it's not 'no problem'. Ryan; you're not alone. It's been happening more and more frequently.
Vancouver psychotherapist Andrew Feldmar has been barred from entering the United States. The reason? During a random stop-and-search at a US/Canadian border crossing, a Google search of his name led to his article from the Spring 2001 'Janus Head: Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature, Continental Philosophy, Phenomenological Psychology, and the Arts.' In it Feldmar describes two acid trips he took under the supervision of his graduate advisor in psychology -- in 1967. This turns out to have been enough to earn him a life-time ban under the grounds of 'admitted drug use.'
Okay, but consider this. Congress says they have to decide to deport within 6 months, but many of these can be held for years. YOU are the one paying the price.
Homeland Security asks congress for $141 per person per night for each person they detain. That's $51,465 a year. Etowah holds these detainees for $40 a night. That's $14,600 per person per year.
Homeland Security keeps the extra $36,865 and adds it to their $98 billion budget. just to put that into perspective, in 2002 when Homeland Security was founded, their operating budget was $49 million. In 2011, it was somewhere between $58-$98 billion.
That's our money. Our tax dollars. And remember also, this country was founded on the principles of 'inalienable human rights' and our Constitution says "No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, and property without due process." no person. Our Founding Fathers didn't make the distinction between legal or illegal, citizen or immigrant, terrorist or activist. The Constitution clearly says NO PERSON.
You will get opposition here from most libertarians, and small-government folk, who don't see any good reason for government to come between an employer and an employee. If I want to hire someone from across the border at a lower wage, what business is it of the government?
Let the free market take care of it.
This guy Stobert did do everything legally. You must have missed this in the article:
Stobert says his troubles began in April 2009 when he accidentally checked the “U.S. Citizen” box on a motorcycle license application. He said that even though he presented his green card and Moldovan passport along with the application, indicating he was in the country legally, two law enforcement officers arrived at his home more than a year and a half later and arrested him for providing false statements on a government application.
He came here legally. Paid all the fees. Had his passport, green card. It took the government a year and a half to find out he checked the wrong box and they want to deport him even though he is here legally and has followed the laws!
He is not illegal. He came here legally, paid the fees, has a green card and a passport, and has started on the process of getting citizenship--first green card, which you have t have for a set number of years, then you can apply for naturalization.
You must have missed this in the article;
Stobert says his troubles began in April 2009 when he accidentally checked the “U.S. Citizen” box on a motorcycle license application. He said that even though he presented his green card and Moldovan passport along with the application, indicating he was in the country legally, two law enforcement officers arrived at his home more than a year and a half later and arrested him for providing false statements on a government application.
He didn't need a visa, he has green card! He is legal, came here legally, paid all the fees, did everything right. Except for checking the wrong box on a license application, and it took the government a year and a half to find the mistake.
You have no idea what being on the wrong side of homeland security is like, so please don't judge those of us who do.
It was easy for you. That is not the case with everyone, and everyone has a different story.
I was adopted as an infant, never told before my parents passed away in a car accident. 18 years after my adoption, USCIS lost my adoption paper and came to me for a copy. I had never known I was adopted and so because I couldn't produce a copy of the adoption paper, they revoked my citizenship and placed me in deportation.
Then they found out there was nowhere to deport me--I was abandoned as an infant at an international orphanage with no birth certificate, so I legally do not have a home country to be deported to,no legal biological parents, I have no idea how old I really am, or what my name originally was. So I was told I would remain in deportation until I gave them a copy of my adoption paper.
I spent three years writing to every courthouse in three states trying to find that paper. Dad was in the Army when I was young, so we moved around a bit, but he got out a few years after I started school and no one ever told me I could have written to the Army for a copy of Dad's records, which would have had the adoption decree.
I was not illegal. No crime had been committed. I was brought here legally, adopted legally, had a legal re-issued BC, brand new DL and a legal SS card. It was not illegal for my parents to have never told me I was adopted, it wasn't illegal for me not to have had a copy of the paper, it wasn't illegal for me not to know I'd been adopted, and it wasn't illegal for the government to lose a piece of paper.
@Amanda
He had his green card but wasn't a US Citizen. It sounds like checking the box was an honest mistake, one which I think the motorcycle dealer should have helped him catch. I made some mistakes on the paperwork when I bought my first firearm. It would have caused problems if not for the personal helping me out double checking and triple checking everything.
The fact that he lost everything is just terrible. He was on his way to the American Dream and poof, gone. ICE should be spending more their already overwhelmed time on actual illegal immegrants and less on paperwork errors and technicalities.
I have a cousin who is in the Mexican military, and he says that immigrants here in the states are treated like kings compare to Mexico, he was telling me how the treat the illegal immigrants in Mexico, damn they treat them like $$$$ h i t they rape the gir;s beat the crap out of guys etc... I don't understand why the human rights people only complain here in the states???
All the reason MORE they should be kicked out and go through the CORRECT PROCESS for immigration.
Alabama's racial Bull Connor mentality! Anybody else notice how much Haley Barbour and Joe Arpaio look like Bull's white trash git? They sure act just like their pa!
@1.19- because they are a lost cause. Mexico encourages its people to leave and frre load off Americans. The solution is to end all immigration. Sweden does not accept immigrants- neither should we.
Amanda.....Maybe it is you that should learn how to read. Read the article again dummy. He overstayed his visa, then got married, and then he checked off U.S. citizen box. Do a little research on the subject and you will find that he only had a 90 day tourist visa but he got married 2 years after he was supposed to have left the country. Was he following the laws of our country then? The judge said he did not check it off by mistake. The judge said he did it intentionally(read the article dummy). In your insane mind you would take the word of a criminal over a judge. Do you think that Stobel just forgot that his visa had run out when he stayed here for 2 years past its expiration??? Do you think that he forgot that he was not a U.S. citizen??? I think not. Obviously the judge has a lot more details than this reporter.
@bethcat
Sweden is small enough that they don't need cheap labor, especially with their banks, but we do as a large, consumer nation.
They complain about other countries too. I guess the US is full of advice to other countries, like telling China we don't like heir policy of only aborting girls, or the human rights situation in the middle eastern countries--we castigate other countries for the same things we do, and the hypocrisy is not lost on human rights groups.
I spent three years in one of those private for-profit immigration prisons when USCIS lost my adoption paper (and I couldn't give them a copy because I had no idea I was adopted. See post 1:17). Food deprivation, sleep deprivation, maggots in the food, no eating utensils, showers and toilets in full view of guards who got their rocks off watching us pee and shower, strip searches and body cavity searches performed by a guard without regard to gender. There were many times when one of these body cavity searches left me bleeding. Underwear given me was still crusted with blood from another woman's period, having never been washed, numerous urinary tract infections and vaginal yeast infections, my pregnant neighbor was raped by the camp chaplain. When the guards got bored they'd pick one of us 'stuck' ones, the ones who couldn't be deported and had little hope of getting out because of missing paperwork, tell us to strip and kneel,hold a gun to our heads and pull the trigger--on an empty gun. After the first few times you sorta got used to the idea it was empty but it didn't keep you from wondering, maybe once, 'is it not going to be empty?' or 'did he miss a bullet...?'
And there are reports of people dying in the camps, bodies cremated and relatives not told they died. people die of medical illnesses that were not treated adequately and their cause of death is listed as 'unresponsive'.
Desertmo, the problem though is that there are plenty of LEGAL citizens that are out of work that could be doing those jobs. I would rather pay more for items than to have a bunch of cheap crimigrants in here doing work that other people should be doing.
@Informed
Oh, I definitely agree. I was just commenting on the no immigrents at all mentality. Almost all first generation legal immigrants become laborers. I just commented on another article last week that I rather they deport all of the illegal immigrants and let in an equal ammount of legal immigrants. The labor won't be as cheap, but the money won't be wasted on people whom most will never become citizens.
what all this under king obama and queen janet napolitano , this cant be
And this is costing Americans how much? I'd have a better chance playing pick up sticks with my butt cheeks then MSNBC writing a pro-american version. How sad.
The article doesn't say anything about Mr. Stobert overstaying a visa:
In 2006, he traveled from Moldova to the United States on a visa. While here, he fell in love and in 2008 married a U.S. citizen. He became a permanent legal resident, bought a house in the Atlanta area and started a cleaning business.
Stobert says his troubles began in April 2009 when he accidentally checked the “U.S. Citizen” box on a motorcycle license application. He said that even though he presented his green card and Moldovan passport along with the application, indicating he was in the country legally, two law enforcement officers arrived at his home more than a year and a half later and arrested him for providing false statements on a government application.
Now a little later, the article says:
Barbados national Hanson Marshall, 35, for example, has been detained by ICE for 23 months. He spent time in detention centers in five states before arriving at Etowah last June.
Marshall, who wears the green shirt that at Etowah signals he’s considered a medium-risk detainee, came to the United States legally when he was 16 and settled in Brooklyn with his family. His visa expired, but he stayed.
But I wasn't talking about Mr. Marshall in my previous post.
He has a green card. Which he couldn't have gotten without having a valid visa. So he got the green card before the visa expired, which means he was here legally.
And how many 'criminals' have been wrongly imprisoned for things they didn't commit? Judges are human too, and they make mistakes. He may also have been biased. As neither of us were there, we can't make a determination one way or another.
He has a green card. He can stay as long as he wants to keep renewing the thing or apply for citizenship once he'd had the green card for a set number of years.
No, you don't forget those things. But on certain forms where the print is close together, a box meant for one line of print might have been meant for the line before it. I HAVE done that several times, particularly a the DMV; fortunately they recognize I'm a couple of points away from being legally blind and they ask me if I meant to check yes to this, no to that. It's also part of the reason why I don't drive--and why the military didn't want me.
See post at 1.14 above.
I wonder what they are doing with those illegals that their home countries won't take back. What a mess this is. Maybe we should move them to their embassies and let them support them. If they leave, arrest them and lock them up as criminals. I don't know. What a tangled web.
I was also amazed at the chart showing how many are being held. I also wonder if we will be privy to how many more are added after their temporary amnesty is rejected. The illegal alien issue is costing this country a huge amount of money with all these scenarios.
Statistics show that American citizens are barely replacing themselves via reproduction and that the USA population is only growing by immigration. As other nations look to come here to escape their own country for many reasons, I don't see an issue with stopping it for a couple of years until we can get our own people back on track. This is not the land of milk and honey anymore. Maybe this article will help open the eyes of those that should not be here, that they could end up there might be a bit of a deterrent.
Or someone who doesn't have a 'home country'.
You have only to look at Guantanamo Bay. some of the people currently being held there have been cleared of all charges of terrorism--many of them are political dissidents in their own country whose government cheerfully handed over to us as 'terrorists' and who we found later had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11. So since we won't let them stay, and their home countries refuse to accept them back, what are they doing with these people, and the illegal and undocumented those countries won't accept back?
And the answer is indefinite detention. Per my post above:
Then they found out there was nowhere to deport me--I was abandoned as an infant at an international orphanage with no birth certificate, so I legally do not have a home country to be deported to,no legal biological parents, I have no idea how old I really am, or what my name originally was. So I was told I would remain in deportation until I gave them a copy of my adoption paper.
And for why indefinite detention is profitable, see my post at 1.14.
This guy is not an American Citizen, so I don't much sympathize (My immediate family members, on three sides, are immigrants) and I find it hard that he 'accidentally' checked the wrong box. Especially, when the next questions, on almost ALL forms (not limited but including, government paperwork, credit card applications, job applications, game entries, rental/home loan applications...get my drift?), are what is your green card number, visa number, etc.- proof of being a legal resident of the United States. Either he's lying, which is most likely or this story is...
Amanda:
Once again you take everything out of context. He did not get his green card until after he was married. I was talking about him staying after his 90 day visa expired. I guess in your feeble mind it is OK to break the law for 2 years and then get your green card. Also, the judge has a lot more details than you or I possess so I trust that he made the correct INFORMED decision. Not your uninformed OPINION. Good luck sticking up for criminals and demeaning law abiding judges.
1. it's obvious why they are being detained and "lost in the system" for undetermined time...because the "system" pays $40 a head a day. the consistant rise on the graph shows the greed keeps rising and salaries are paid. another way our gov waste away our tax dollars.
a friend in fed prison in ft worth, tx said the prison was filling up with illegals who after being caught a number of times are giving 10 yr sentences. but i think they actually like it in there. but being an illegal is much diff than ones in article legally here. at $40 a day what the hay right? not.
also take notice that healthcare is now avail to them...something obama was trying to deny at congress when the congressman yelled "you lie". congressman was right and knew it as did everyone else except for his all believing zombies.
I am a Legal immigrant working on getting my citizenship. Been here Legally for the last 13 years. Prior to that, I was back and forth from my home counrty and the USA because my step father was military and we moved back and forth a lot. I was always here legally.
Now according to some of the responses I have seen on here, if I make a simple mistake such as checking a wrong bx, I should be deported? Even though I have been a productive member of society who has a job, pays taxes, volunteers in my community and has my own medical insurance? Are you really saying that people who are legal and trying to become citizens shouldn't be here either? I am just asking for clarification.
I may have been born in another country, but this is home to me. I do everything asked of me so that I can stay here. I have never been on welfare, collected food stamps or been in public housing. I work for everything I have.
a message to all you illegals- SIGN your DEPORTATION ORDERS and save our country some money !!!!!!
Oh, come ON, we do NOT have a long unbroken border with Moldavia or Africa. Those two examples were carefully chosen to avoid mentioning the real problem: the flood of illegals across that long unbroken border we DO have with Mexico.
Beanie, Did you miss the part where he's also in jail for an 'aggravated felony' which has nothing to do with signing the wrong box (which I don't doubt he did on purpose)?
Yes, that he should be deported for, in and of itself.
Pakistani authorities arrested a Christian girl in the eleventh for blasphemy and desecration of the Koran pages.
According to Pakistani media that the girl was detained on charges of blasphemy after he called collect angry arrest them and threatened to burn the homes of Christians on the outskirts of the capital, Islamabad.
Officials say the girl suffered from learning difficulties and she was unable to answer questions the police.
The police impounded the girl's parents to protect them after they had received threats.
Said Paul Patty Minister coexistence in a Pakistani national told the BBC that it is well known that the girl suffers from a mental disorder and that it was "unlikely to have desecrated the Koran deliberately."
He Patty "from the reports that I've seen, seen the girl carrying bag waste was inside some pages of the Koran. This angered residents of the area and gathered a great collection to take action against it. Police were reluctant at first to her arrest, but under pressure from the angry crowd that threatened burned Christian homes. "
Pakistani Christians complain that they are often accused unjustly of blasphemy.
It condemned the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan charges against the girl. The newspaper quoted "without" the Committee as saying "the fact that the girl suffers from mental problems makes the accusation barbaric."
The minister said Pakistan "fled about 600 people from the Christian Quarter. Working to ensure security in the region so that they can return to their homes."
Patty said that the incident took place on the seventeenth of August / August after Friday prayers.
He urged the activists in the field of human rights Pakistan to reform the blasphemy laws controversial, and under which the accused was jailed for life on charges of desecration of the Koran.
And killed many of the accused of blasphemy by a massive crowd, also targeted politicians who seek to change the laws.
In the past year killed Patty Shabazz and Minister for Minorities after demand for the abolition decision kayaking.
I'm sure all the imigrants in these jails are inocent. Just ask them!
White immigrants, black, latino or other, if you're here illegally you deserve what you get.
You'll have to forgive the people that have distain for anyone that wasn't actually born in the country. They hate because of skin color, religion. political affiliation---just hate. Welcome to America and work towards making it a place of peace and harmony for all people.
@ hs321,
Hiring illegal's, we have Mayors telling illegal's even posting in the want adds for illegal's to come to their cities no questions asked. How do you expect law enforcement officers to do their jobs when they are being told to look the other way? Hiring illegals, we should be putting anyone not enforcing our laws in jail! Including our President!!
beanie. When the question is " Are you a citizen" And the two answers are " Yes__— or NO__" If you answer yes, then you are a liar. How could you mistakenly answer that simple question?
This guy is lying I live in GA & have my motorcycle license I don't remember any box to check if you are a US citizen. He was charged with an aggravated felony, so he did something worse than that. I looked up the law in the Immigration and Nationality Act.
Pretty serious rant, there. This guy, his name was Joseph, moved his wife, Mary and son, Jesus to Egypt illegally and held a job. To date, Jesus is the best known illegal immigrant. What would you do with him, Pilot?
Must be nice to live a life of perfection. Tell the rest of the world what it's like.
That is why it's called a mistake. Or are you immune to them? I see them every single day on the job applications I review. Mistakes on simple questions they most likely answered correctly a million times before.
Maybe you two could step down from your pedestals of perfection long enough to join us in reality sometime.
Nice racket the government has though. A great way to funnel billions into the system.
I didn't see that in the article.
You cannot get a green card unless you show a valid, unexpired visa or an extension for one. That original 90 day visa may have expired, but you can apply to stay under extensions and other reasons. He may have applied for the green card before the visa expired which would give him legal permission to stay until the green card application is approved or denied. Yes, that approval can take up to 2 years.
Judges are human, just like the rest of us. My sole experience with judges in the criminal court system hasn't been stellar--A registered child sexual predator 9did ten years in jail for molesting a 10 year old girl) in my neighborhood saw me from behind, thought I was young, and groped me. The appeals judge overturned his conviction for assault and battery and 4th degree sex offense on the grounds that he didn't try to remove my clothes so it wasn't a sexual assault, and because I wasn't a minor it wasn't a reflection of his prior bad act. I was 28 at the time but had repeatedly been mistaken for a kid (certain stores in my municipality won't serve anyone under 18 during school hours, and I've been kicked out of several places despite my attempts to show my DL to prove my age.) He ended up only doing 8 months for illegal weapons charges and now lives two blocks away from a school.
Judges aren't perfect. They have the same fallacies as any of the rest of us. They have to base their decisions on whatever evidence the cops put in front of them, and we all know cops can be racist, ignorant, and on a power trip. Not all, but some. I know a lot of my municipality's cops from working nights at the local convenience store. Most are good..some I wouldn't trust with my kids.
Yes. Add to that the assets that are seized from detainees before they are sent to deportation camps--if you don't have a legal spouse or next of kin to leave your stuff to, the government seizes your houses, cars, bank accounts, etc. before putting you in a deportation camp and deporting you. It all comes down to a considerable amount going into Homeland Security's coffers.
Of course, they are using that money wisely. Surveillance systems that can be mounted to drones that will monitor 4 square miles of US terrain, portable DNA analyzers, a computer-based behavior assessment system currently being used by TSA at Boston Airport to scan people for increased respiration, perspiration, pulse racing, eyes darting, increased heart rate because thise are the people in an airport who are terrorists looking to blow up a plane. With this system they can be arrested before they can commit a terrorist act.
Amanda - You really think our forefathers would consider ILLEGAL persons to be judged under our constitution? Where Indians convicted under our laws? Or were they just killed?
Amanda-2017567- it really is unfortunate for your loss however how is this the systems fault? Your parents adopted you, apparently without a birth certificate and the agency you were adopted from has no records. That alone sounds so sketchy because orphans adopted by a U.S. citizen parent are citizens once their adoption is final and they have lawfully entered the United States as permanent residents. Children who did not immigrate as orphans, but who were adopted by a U.S. citizen parent and obtained lawful permanent resident status also automatically acquire citizenship (so long as they meet all the criteria prior to their 18th birthday). That would mean your family or you would have still had to file a Form N-600 (or Form N-600K) to actually begin your citizenship process when you became of legal age. You have your parents to blame for not keeping tabs on your (IR-4) or (IH-4): http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=32dffe9dd4aa3210VgnVCM100000b92ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=32dffe9dd4aa3210VgnVCM100000b92ca60aRCRD
The problem is O'Bama and his boy Eric and the worthless Janet who heads ICE. ENFORCE THE U.S. IMMIGRATION LAWS AND THESE PROBLEMS GO AWAY!! The U.S. needs elected officials who will respect and enforce the laws of the U.S. and protect and serve the Legal U.S. Citizens of the U.S. and not cater and kiss the backsides of foreign countries. We need elected officials who will enforce U.S. Laws and not allow foreign countries to dictate their wishes in our Courts. Foreign Countries should not be suing U.S. States or U.S. Citizens in U.S. Courts and U.S. Courts should not allow the laws of Foreign Countries overide and replace U.S. Laws. Kick them out of the U.S. when they come here illegally - no detention - Illegals and their families only have a right to be removed from the U.S. - no appeals and no months being supported by Legal Citizens Tax dollars. If the countries don't "want" them back, that's their problem, drop them off at the airport in their country of origin. They then become the problem of their country of origin. Don't like the food, leave. Don't like our jails - leave. Everyone of the Illegal Aliens in this article are having issues because they violated the U.S. Immigration Laws. They did it themselves and should be immediately deported.
There's nothing in the article that mentions what type of VISA he had originally. There's nothing that says it was for 90 days. You need to provide something to prove what you're saying.
Aside from the pointless insults, you're really missing something here. At the point where he was granted a green card (or Permanent Residency as it's actually called) USCIS has decided that he is eligible to stay in the country. If he had any violations of his VISA, then they decided that it ultimately didn't matter and they would allow him residency anyway.
Do you have any idea of the process you have to go through to get a 'green card'? I do. It can take a long time, depending on how you go about it, where you're from, and how lucky you are with the USCIS center your application is sent to and what their workload is like. Mine took over 4 months and that was very, very quick.
It just so happens Ido, that Obama deported a million immigrants in is his first two and a half years in office, compared to the 1.5 million that Bush deported in his entire administration of 8 years, which would put Obama on pace to deport more in 4 yrs than Bush did in 8 yrs. So before you start carrying on about how easy Obama is on immigrants, do a little research first. I know how much you righties like to just make stuff up about Obama, but get used to being called on your flim-flammery between now and November.
@ KC
That's only a half-truth. President Obama is the only president to count immigrants turned around at the border as a "deportation."
Yes, the UN has special rules about people who want to internationally adopt undocumented abandoned children, per their initiative to reduce statelessness (people with no citizenship anywhere.) A lot of kids are adopted from this situation, mostly because there is zero chance of a birth parent ever showing up--most US adoptions/domestic adoptions are open, meaning a biological parent can show up at any time, even years later, and still have a right to the child. The chance is greatly reduced with international adoptions and nonexistent with undocumented/stateless children.
The agency I was adopted from closed in the 18 years since my adoption and I coudn't find out where all their records would have been sent. I could only earn enough money working around the deportation camp to send one letter a week, and so I focused on just finding the paper, not asking where the adoption agency was or where their records were. I could only earn enough to make one ten minute phone call every two weeks--want to take a guess how long I would have been on hold waiting for someone to figure out where the records from an adoption agency that closed 16 years ago went? And if I took that ten minute phone call option I couldn't send a letter for those two weeks.
Automatic citizenship upon adoption is the law now, but it was not when I was adopted.
And that was where I got stuck. I met all the criteria, but since THEY lost the adoption decree and I didn't have a copy, they did not take my birth certificate as proof that an adoption had taken place (it's customary after an adoption for the adoptive parents to show the adoption decree to a judge, who then issues a birth certificate showing the adoptive parents as the child's natural parents. The judge will not issue a BC without having seen that adoption decree.) That was when they decided the missing paper made me undocumented and detained me as 'illegal'.
You did see the part where I explained Dad and Mom died in a car accident? I think you'd agree that it's pretty hard to keep tabs on your adopted child's paperwork when you're dead!
ICE came looking for me five months after I turned 18. I had no idea I was adopted, and I didn't have any extended family who would have known--Dad split with his family when he brought Mom over after his service in Korea. They didn't understand why he would bring a Korean war bride home when he'd been over there fighting them, so I have no grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. who might have known.
How to fix the problem: 1) do not over stay your visa, 2) don't do anything illegal, 3) after you get married (or not) apply to become a US citizen. There you go. Problem fixed! This person had plenty of time to become a US citizen, but he didn't.
He has a green card. He is a legal immigrant. He did nothing wrong. BTW, marrying a US Citizen does nothing for gaining citizenship.
I also said : "or not". But you can apply after that. I also said he had plenty of time to apply, but he did not.
JBAbbott "He did nothing wrong."
Really? Then why the charge of an aggravated felony?
Ivan Stobert was locked up for committing a felony. His original problems, as related to the story, started when he incorrectly filled out an application for a drivers license, which is where the immigration issues come in.
Grace, The earliest he could have applied for citizenship was 3 years after he married a citizen. He married in 2008 so in 2011 he was eligible to apply for citizenship. He got in trouble before that.
Ed from Boulder: "Really? Then why the charge of an aggravated felony?"
The story was poorly written. There were to many holes in it. Maybe he got caught up in some other mischief.... who knows. Stories like these leave out some important parts in order to strengthen the authors personal views.
@maddog-752810
Am I the only one that read he got in trouble because he checked the "US Citizen" box on accident when buying a motorcycle? Falsifying information on a federal document is considered an aggravated felony.
Anyway, It would take the man 3 years after marriage to apply for a green card and then 5 years after that before becomes a naturalized citizen. He was doing things the legal way, for which I applaud him.
Desertmo :
Thank you, finally someone read the article!!!not to mention which, it took the government a year and a half to discover that erroneously checked box!!
Amanda and Desertmo:
You both keep leaving out the most important part of this story. The judge said that he checked the box intentionally not by mistake. Stop saying he checked it by mistake unless you think the judge is a liar.
It might also help not to get married. I mean, if this guy hadn't gotten married, he wouldn't have lost his wife.
@John
Because judges are always impartial and right? Why would this guy risk his green card by intentially checking the US Citizen box? He had, what, 3-4 years to go? It's not like couldn't have bought a motorcycle by checking the legal immigrant box.
Is the judge able to read his mind and know that he did it intentionally? I've certainly been accused of doing things on purpose when it was truly accidental. I'm not sure what he had to gain by checking it purposefully, and it seems he obviously had a lot to lose.
that's what i thought when you marry us citizen you can become citizen. why wouldn't he have done that i wonder?
I've worked at quite a few companies that had production departments that were entirely illegal. Mexicans, Mungs, Hondurans, Malaysians and more. I talked with quite a few of them during breaks and asked many if they were pursuing American citizenship. In almost all cases they did want to become American citizens at all. They reasoning they gave for being here was to send as much money back home as they could no matter what conditions they had to put up with. Many were packing themselves in small apartments and living at an extremely minimal level, sometimes 8 or more in a one bedroom apartment....... because they could pool their funds, live a cheaply as possible and send money home where they had every intention of returning to. They did not want the responsibility of citizenship and yes, they knew what they were doing was illegal but they though it was worth the risk. Just my own personal experience with illegals.
What I didn't understand, in the beginning of the article it said Mr. Stobert was arrested for an aggravated felony. There is something NBCNEWS left out I don't think checking the wrong box is an aggravated felony. Mr. Stobert might have lied during the interview & left out what he was really arrested for. This is the definition of an aggravated felony by the "Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)" that was passed in 2002.
It is also an aggravated felony to attempt or conspire to commit an aggravated felony.
its a jail not the bellagio. pro tip: if you dont want to be in jail dont commit a crime.
He has a green card. He is a legal immigrant. He did nothing wrong.
how minute it is,he did check the wrong block on a federal form.
And those forms can be confusing even for a citizen.
Having a green card is not a free pass. The article mention he stayed passed his visa. The United States has an unbelievable no compliance problem with illegal immigration.
This isn't just a South American,Mexico problem it is many different peoples.
It's time that ANYONE that is not a U.S. citizen and is here illegally be deported back to what ever country they came from and a permanent revocation of entering the country again in their lifetime.
If a U.S. citizen were to go to any other country with out going through the proper channels;They would be incarcerated.
They would not be detained in a comfortable environment,they would be put in a jail or prison.
Many are left there without any charges or representation. Many have spent years there. So, JBAbbott unless you have some other bleeding heart reason to believe that the U.S. is in some great human rights violation then button it.
a motorcycle license is an endorsement on an existing operators license.
the forms are not hard. you either are or are not a citizen
From the article: But the love affair ended in December 2010, when the slight 25-year-old found himself locked up indefinitely in the Etowah County Detention Center in northeast Alabama, charged with an aggravated felony and facing deportation.
Please note "aggravated felony".
So yeah, he did do something wrong besides check the wrong box on an official government application.
And you can find Ivan on several social networks. Succssful business owner? His LinkedIn profile says server and bartender.
Might Mr. Slovek have an ongoing problem telling the truth?
checking the wrong box on a government form WAS the aggravated felony charge. he didn't rob a liquor store at gun point too.
my question is...why does this process take so long? deport him or not...why so long?
What IndependantTexan said. Falsifying information on a federal document is considered an aggravated felony, whether intentional or not. The article should have cleared that up for people who don't know but, man, you people are on this guy like he assaulted someone as well.
As to why it took so long, ICE has a huge backlog problem like most of our federal agencies. Too much work and too little manpower.
The visa is only permission to travel to the US in order to stay for a time. After that time you either have to have a green card or you have to leave. He had a green card. Therefore he was not illegal.
Yes, the US is in violation of human rights. I spent three years in one of those private for-profit immigration prisons when USCIS lost my adoption paper (and I couldn't give them a copy because i had no idea I was adopted. See post 1:17). Food deprivation, sleep deprivation, maggots in the food, no eating utensils, showers and toilets in full view of guards who got their rocks off watching us pee and shower, strip searches and body cavity searches performed by a guard without regard to gender. There were many times when one of these body cavity searches left me bleeding. Underwear given me was still crusted with blood from another woman's period, having never been washed, numerous urinary tract infections and vaginal yeast infections, my pregnant neighbor was raped by the camp chaplain.
And there are reports of people dying in the camps, bodies cremated and relatives not told they died. people die of medical illnesses that were not treated adequately and their cause of death is listed as 'unresponsive'.
Look at Amnesty International's reports on US deportation camps. And Human Rights Watch.
He might as well assaulted someone. They group such charges together criminally.
how minute it is,he did check the wrong block on a federal form
Since when does the federal government issue motorcycle license or record purchase of a motorcycle. The probably wasn't an alien checkbox or some other alabama nonsense
I agree wth some of what is wrote here. But humane treatmnt is something else. An American citizen who commits a crime and ends up in federal prison for rape murder, and anything else, seems to have more rights than us free people do, and I might add, they have a bed, phones, tv's, computers. They live on our taxpayers money, They have uprisiings, they kill our men and woman who work there, they don't care. They are already in prison, what going to happen to them"a longer sentences. A lot are lifers are on death row. They live for years without any worries. The government in most states says its wrong to take a life in the gas chambers, hanging. They say it is their human right not face this kind of death, but they didn't think their victims had any human rights. No this is not about our federal prisioners, and a citizen of the United states. Its about illegal citizens, and the prsion in Alabama, and money they recieve for each illegal. The state of Alabama is so far behind in their laws, they haven't changed them in decades. The building of the prison we saw looked good from the out side. I can believe what they say about the food and how they are treated. Alabama is a sorry state. Yes they need to be sent back to their countries, and now, not years from now. The President as far as I am concern opened the doors for Illegal. Now he needs to close it, but not possibe, he wants the Hispanic vote. We have an example going on right now. This bus of illegals riding across this country-- advertising they are not citizen and have no fear. Why have they not been detained and drove back across the border????? They are out their flaunting our laws in our face, and the ICA is not doing much, well if they backlogged, let the bordeer patarol come in an escort them back to thir homland.
You do realize that in a country with 312 million people, two people might have the same name?
Even though Congress said ICE/DHS has to do something with a person within six months, Homeland security isn't called to account when they violate that law, so it is not enforced.
And because the longer ICE/DHS holds him, the more money they get. See post at 1.14 for the figures.
The more money DHS gets, the more money the private prison gets, the more money the lobbyist gets, and the more gratuities the Congressman gets from that lobbyist to pass more laws that feeds more detainees into the system.
There's a bill currently coming up through Congress called the Enemy Expatriation Act that will allow the government to strip you of your citizenship if you're suspected of supporting or advocating terrorism (even something as simple as banking with an institution that is suspected of funding a terrorist, or printing a flyer for a terrorist organization like the KKK or the Christian Identity Movement or an invitation flyer to an Odinist's Viking War Re-enactment) and then you'll be just another illegal.
I didn't get my editing finnished!
Marine 55
"how minute it is,he did check the wrong block on a federal form"
Since when does the federal government issue motorcycle license or record purchase of a motorcycle. There probably wasn't an alien checkbox or some other Alabamaian nonsense on the form. Vehicle licenses are not recorded with the federal government, only firearms. This had to be an Alabama form. Alabama is constantly searching anything and everything to jail anyone and everyone for the profit not just immigrants. Although you are not the only one posting nonsense here, you show your Knowledge is disgraceful to the USMC!!!
JBAbbot look up the "Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)" it doesn't matter if you have a green card they can still deport you.
Red, it happened in GA. He was from Atlanta, they just sent him to jail in AL.
Accidently checked the wrong box. Yeah, right. Just that box and nothing else?
He has a green card. He is a legal immigrant. He did nothing wrong but make a mistake filling out a form. For that he was jailed for 1 year w/o any legal council or arraignment by a judge. This could happen to anyone immigrant or citizen alike.
JBAbbott- Your wrong, and you keep spaming the board. My wife was from another country and we did the work right. He messed up and got in trouble with the law, that is automatic disqualification and to add he was past his visa. You know nothing about the process and like the rest of the bleading heart lemmings out there eat this crap up. It took my wife and I to go from nothing to full blown US Citizen and have friends that have done the same. These people who cry bloody murder at the process are full of @!$%#. It is extremely easy and if you don't have the time "check the correct box" when you are doing your paperwork then you deserve what you get. To easy to blame others and the system when its your own patetic fault.
your spamming the board by posting the same thing over and over.
glad it was easy for you. might i ask what country you immigrated from?
it's not that easy for everyone.
Who cares. If they're not here legally lock them up until you can deport them.
Bob,
those boxes that you checked incorrectly on that multiple choice math exam were accidents too, not because of your knowledge so the teacher should have given you an A+ anyhow.
Be thankful your not a cow!
What part of "you broke the law" is it that you dont understand. With the huge problem of illegal aliens in this country you think you should get special treatment. You are a criminal no matter the offence. Granted the allegations of beatings, and sexual abuse should not be tolerated anywhere, we (US) are not obligated to furnish your with the best of everything when we have law abiding citizens that go without.
He has a green card. He is a legal immigrant. He did nothing wrong but make a mistake filling out a form. For that he was jailed for 1 year w/o any legal council or arraignment by a judge. Once a judge saw him he was released. Legally this means he was never arrested. Legally an Arrest has not been made until you are arraigned by a Judge.
wrong
JBAbbott, simply repeating the same bs doesn't make what you're saying true. I was a green card holder before becoming a citizen and that was in the days when once you had it, you had it basically forever, none of this renewable stuff they have now. BUT... even back then 30 years ago, it was made clear when you finally got approved that committing any felony exposed you to the possibility of having that revoked and being deported. That's the way it should be. You're being given a chance to make a new life for yourself in a new country. The least you can do is obey their laws.
There's more to this story than is being told. He was booked with an aggravated felony. That's not simply checking the wrong box on a drivers license form.
The story also is missing the fact that I am sure he has been given the opportunity to post an immigration bail bond. Usually those are in the realm of $25K. Maybe he can't afford it, but to be brutally frank he should have thought about that earlier before committing whatever felony he did.
And finally for all the bleeding hearts, does it not occur to you there are good old plain regular real American citizens also being held in facilities while awaiting trial? Many of those facilities are no better. In fact, you'll find those "illegals" being held in ICE facilities, private subcontractor facilities and local county jails get better treatment than many other "innocent until proven guilty" for the simple reason that yard time, etc is regulated stricter with Federal rules than at most county levels.
the penalty for for invasion of a foreign country should be death...stay in your own country make it better live long and prosper...don't invade a foreign country and make it worse...and quit over populating your own countries...plain bob 2012...
Yeah, let's throw those damn foreign tourists in jail and execute them all. We don't need their stinkin' money. /s
Do you think there might be a slight difference between a tourist in the country legally and someone invading the country, based on the fact they entered the country illegally?
So the little kids who don't have a choice to immigrate should be killed too? Babies, toddlers, and children killed for what their parents chose to do. We would become more and more like Stalin and Hitler. Oh wait, we would be just like them if we followed your wishes.
It's medication time, plain bob.
It appears humanity is out of the question with you, unfortunately....
good that people have different opion's.. cute meds comment...puss...
This is as bad as the border protection mess. What's with the great Napolitano???
Haven't you heard kmwaz? Napolitano has been too busy sexually harassing male members of the Homeland Security staff to be able to spend time on insignificant problems such as this.
In all the media I am yet to see the limbo of the un-employment lines illegal immigrants create featured. Everybody deserves their day in court but the court of public opinion, run by the sensationalist, melodrama addicted media is tilted against the working man who is a citizen of the United States. Where is the sympathetic story about the construction worker, the mechanic, the technician who is unemployed or underpaid because of illegal immigrants. And don't hand me that garbage about them taking jobs no one else will take. It isn't true and all the self-righteousness you can muster doesn't make it true.
It's not that they are taking jobs that noone else wants...its that American companies can pay them below sub standard wages and not have to worry about paying taxes on thier payroll. I worked at a large bakery that hired illegals paid them 20 bucks for a 10 hour day...so no I can't imagine any American would work for that heck i wouldn't.. the problem is that they are making it easier for business owners to turn a profit and get rich (this owner had so much money it was crazy, hiring legals would have just lowered his profit margin) people who have to make a living here by paying taxes, paying mortgages and raise thier children can't do it anymore because whatever jobs havn't gone out of the country are being held people who are willing to work for peanuts because to them its good enough...my mom started working in America for less than a buck an hour, American manufacturing workers built this country and are now getting kicked in the teeth, not everyone has the ability to attend college some still need to work with their hands to get by and try to send thier kids to college..so yes it is true I've seen it first hand the bakery I worked before that closed down average pay $15-$17 dollars an hour with health insurance.over 200 employees...opened up again with all illegals ...so I am sorry my sympanthy goes for the tax payers who are loosing out but i don't blame the illegals I blame the business owners who pay them!!! and I am sure there are many carpenters who can tell you that for every illegal on a job site making 20 bucks an hour there are 5 illegals making 6 bucks an hour..until they learn what the legals do the legals are gone.
Lisa...you should write your representatives and tell them you are not going to vote for them, no matter how much money the bakery owner gives to their campaign.
hs321...lol the whole city including politicians new what was going on there and he had been reported many times. Property taxes couldn't be avoided as easily and a running company in the city makes more money for the city then a shut down one, they don't care about how the state/fed is affected. this man has since died and I have since left the state. The mayor use to be he buddy whatever mayor it happened to be Dem/Republican he didn't care.
And since Alabama implemented strict hiring checks for immigration status on farm workers crops have been rotting in the fields (or would have been if not for the drought) because they couldn't find American citizens who would work for the wages and under the conditions that the illegals would.
Few Americans want to work 14 hour days for $10/day.
Severed..."Few Americans want to work 14 hour days for $10/day."
How much do Americans want to work for? What if you told an able-bodied young man who has been on welfare for years, "Hey, no reason why you can't do some manual labor. Go to work making what ever you can and the government will make up any deficit or go without." But that would be indignant of us. As indignant as being a welfare leech.
I'd have no problem sending welfare leeches to pick the harvest, them or those in jail/prisons. Don't people get sick of paying for them to sit on their butts doing nothing, they ought to be made to pay for themselves, just like everyone else.
What in the world is Queen Napolitano getting paid for? Mismanagement? This is as bad as the job being done on border protection.
Thought she resigned?
Simple solution: Send 'em home.
That's what the Navajoes, Cherokees and many, many others have been saying for a lot looooonger time.
zflynn- That's true but you forget,just like any country or nation that has been established and has faced a entity that has a more developed society. The reality is and always has been when a society has a greater mass or might they other society is forced to change. Does this make it right? yes/No .
But I would bet that you are reaping the rewards of the conqueror's.
Last I checked, we are still a nation of laws. Break the law, face the consequences. It's really quite simple.
You better check again.
"When a President can ignore the plain language of duly passed laws, and substitute his own executive orders, then we no longer have "a government of laws, and not of men" but a President ruling by decree, like the dictator in some banana republic.
When we confine our debates to the merits or demerits of particular executive orders, we are tacitly accepting arbitrary rule. The Constitution of the United States cannot protect us unless we protect the Constitution. But, if we allow ourselves to get bogged down in the details of particular policies imposed by executive orders, and vote solely on that basis, then we have failed to protect the Constitution -- and ourselves." - Thomas Sowell
"Endure"?? That prison looks pretty fancy and brand-new, so it seems like staying there would almost be a reward for committing a crime; which costs us even more of our hard-earned money i.e. tax dollars. If you don't like sitting in your comfy prison cell eating food that's free-to-you, follow OUR rules, or get sent back to wherever it is you came from before you started taking advantage of us!!
Try it sometime, then get back to us and tell us what you think.
Commit a crime, do the time. Can't do the time, don't commit the crime. It is that easy.
A couple of things come to mind when reading this article: Looks like many of the people are of the one strike and you're out principle, and gee, doesn't everybody make mistakes once in a while? The gentleman profiled at the beginning of the article came into this country legally, married and had been a taxpayer. Yes, he committed a crime, but he is much more deserving of staying in this country than people who come illegally, take from the system, and don't pay taxes.
That is why I love the Canadian immigration system. If you overstay your visa you will be fished out and deported. It is only in America where people want rights even when they have broken the country's immigration laws. That is why I blame both the Democrats and the republicans. Make responsible laws that apply to any immigrant and stop playing immigrants from one country against the other. I hope the government will not waste time in deporting ll these law breakers. US immigration lawyers should also be respectful of their country's laws and know that this country will be here for their future descendants so they should stop defending people who break US immigration laws just for money. Money is the root of all evil=Immigration Lawyers.
It's so freezing cold in Canada they probably don't mind leaving.
Canadians are no-nonsense kind of people.
They're not going to make exceptions and give handouts to people who enter illegally and don't pay for their share.
canada also doesnt allow people with misdemeanor or felony convictions into their country to begin with. try crossing their border with a dui conviction or a petty theft conviction and see how far you get. but in the united states any loser can sneak across the border and get welfare and food stamps the next day. this country is going down the crapper. 20 years from now most of the united states will look like haiti.
I had a Canadian boyfriend for ten years. He complained bitterly about Canada providing welfare for the mass numbers of middle easterners coming to some of their cities. Guess that was okay, but he also said you couldn't own a pitbull in his town.
You say the food in the detention center is rotten and you are a victim of inhumane treatment?
But I don't understand; how did you get there to begin with?
And why don't I have to give up my freedom or eat rotten food like these people?
Oh... I obey laws and don't sneak into foreign countries. That's why.
The man has a green card, he didn't sneak into the country you dolt!
no but he committed a aggrevated felony..so who cares.
WOW, talk about a dolt! Where did she mention one specific man? By the way, the man who was quoted on the food, they didn't mention whether or not he had a green card.
And love the detainees who all know what the standards are for ICE. Can you say detention center lawyers?
Rotten food? Really? He checked a wrong box and you think thats deserving of rotten food?
An "aggravated felony" is not checking the wrong box...www.vkblaw.com/law/aggravated.htm
The immigrant was charged with..........."AGGRAVATED FELONY"...............................................................
The charges were ..............:"DISMISSED"..................................................................................................
One is ......................"INNOCENT".......until........."PROVEN GUILTY"........by a "COURT of LAW"....................
............................WE............ARE............A............NATION.............OF...........IMMIGRANTS...........................
............................WE............ARE............A............NATION.............OF...................LAWS.............................
There is an abundance of empirical evidence that IMMIGRATION is a tremendous economic driver. A recent study by the "PARTNERSHIP" for a "NEW AMERICAN ECONOMY", a coalition of Mayors and business leaders advocating for rational "IMMIGRATION LAWS", is a wash, with, EYE-OPENING DATA on IMMIGRANT ENTREPRENEURSHIP. More than 40 percent of FORTUNE 500 companies were founded by IMMIGRANTS or THEIR CHILDREN, and IMMIGRANTS are now more than twice as likely as US NATIVES to START a BUSINESS. Though the foreign-born accounted for less than 13 percent of US population, they CREATED 28% of ALL AMERICAN BUSINESS in 2011.
Rupert Murdock and Mayor Bloomberg (billionaires) of New York, two of the PARTNERSHIP'S, CO-CHAIRMAN, argue THAT IF ONLY MORE AMERICAN UNDERSTOOD WHAT REMARKABLE JOB-CREATORS IMMIGRANTS TEND TO BE............FEWER POLITICIANS would feel the need to play ANTI-IMMIGRANT XENOPHOBIA...........Fewer VOTERS would believe the POPULAR CANARD that FOREIGNERS ENTER TO LIVE OFF WELFARE---------or the equally popular, if contradictory, CANARD that IMMIGRANTS STEAL JOBS that otherwise go to AMERICANS...............
"People don't come here to PUT UP THEIR FEET AND COLLECT WELFARE"......BLOOMBERG said......"THEY COME HERE TO WORK".......If there are NO JOBS.......they DON'T COME.......You'd NEVER KNOW IT from CLAMOR over ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION-----'Put a damn fence on the border'-------'and start shooting'....one GOP Congressional candidate advised...........BUT ILLEGAL BORDER CROSSINGS HAVE SHARPLY DECLINED UNDER PRESIDENT OBAMA......
What hasn't declined is the HUNGER of STRIVERS and DREAMERS the world over..........Talented entrepreneurs eager to bring their gifts here and make a success of themselves.........
....................THOSE WOULD BE IMMIGRANTS ARE EXTRA-ORDINARY GROWTH.......................
....................................GROWTH HARMONE WE CAN'T AFFORD TO SPURN..................................
.........A BROKEN IMMIGRATION SYSTEM THREATENS AMERICA FUTURE ECONOMIC VITALITY..........
....FIXING THE SYSTEM MUST BECOME A PRIORITY---FOR THE LEFT--RIGHT--AND CENTER ALIKE................
.............................WE NEED COMPREHENSIVE IMMIGRATION NOW! NOW! NOW!.......................
What has your BS post to do with mine? Nothing to do with the fact this guy's a HUGE liar. And yet, you can post till you're blue in the face, checking the wrong box is not an 'aggressive felony', that is a separate charge.
As to the rest, we already have a way to immigrate to this country, my Mother did from Greece, my fathers mother from Norway and so did one of my best friends from India, without any issues, but they didn't commit crimes either...
Deport, don't support non citizen felons...
Just another bleeding heart article demonizing any attempt to enforce our immigration laws. NBC has completely gone to the bad place. There should be a disclaimer, "For entertainment purposes only" prefacing each article.
Well said. NBC no longer brings us news, just editorial content. Sad.
It's not just NBC, the politicians hands are tied because too many constituents have illegals in their family and they don't want to lose their votes. The US is not going to do anything with the Immigration issue no time soon, meanwhile drugs, guns, money, prostitutes, child laborers, terrorists and criminals can come into this country with no problem at all and have as many babies as they want and collect welfare and foodstamps and public housing.
Yeah, that's what English settlers here said about the Irish. And then both said it about the Italians and Jews. Then they all together said it about Poles, Greeks, Hungarians. And now all in chorus say it about anyone else. What's more American than that?!
GodblessAmerica-1789597
..........................................Respectfully, beg to, disagree with your comments..................................
..................Immigration Laws are far more complex than you and I can ever imagined..............
" charged with an aggravated felony"
Ship him home. NOW.
Good, I'm glad they get as little as they do because it's MY tax $$$ paying for it. Maybe they will get tired of fighting to stay here and agree to go HOME and STAY there!!!!
The cost of a parachute?
Cheaper than keeping these folks in custody for a long time. Their country doesn't want criminals returned home? Too bad.
Just what I was thinking.....If their home country doesn't want them back through the "Legal" door then drop them off via parachute with a GPS tracker embedded in them, so I.C.E. can find them if they come back again.
We are the ONLY country that puts up with all of this nonsense. 20 years ago I went backpacking through Europe and was asked if I had X amount of money and if I didn't I could not get a job and work.
I told them fine by me I'm here on vacation and had worked for 2 years to get the money for this 2 month stay. I also had $10,000 on me at the time too. I had a BLAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Working while on vacation in another country is for losers anyways.....lol
These "immigration" issues really have nothing to do with immigration it's all straw dogs, contrived problems that elicit people's fears and used as distractions to cover the real intent: the militarization of the homeland aka Homeland Security. Policing and militarization in the US generate ENORMOUS profits for the corporate powers that control them. America will turn into-if it hasn't already-a fascist state. What the average person doesn't realize the intent really is not anti-Hispanic or anti-Black or anti-anything in particular but to keep the "little people" futility fighting amongst themselves while the upper 1% profit off the massively profitable incarceration systems (jails/prisons/detention centers), law enforcement and US military- the vast bulk of which is privatized. That's why over 40,000 new laws were written last year alone.
Americans can wake up and toss out the blood profiteering criminals or they can continue to gorge on junk food, filling their bodies and minds with poison while the upper 1% laugh at the little people destroying each other and profiteer off their suffering. Many Americans are duped into thinking this is "free enterprise".
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45819570/ns/us_news-life/t/new-laws-toughen-rules-abortions-immigrants-voters/
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2012/May/Nation-of-Criminals-Selling-Prisons-for-Profit/
Well said, zflynn...APPLAUDED when I read this!!!!
Perhaps since these immigration issue are nothing to you you should be or have one of your family or friends raped, kidnapped or home invaded by a few illgals instead of a 2month to a 97 year old grandmoth: both in their own beds. READ FBI stats and check you local politice blotter...ignorance kills and you must either be a former illegal still illegal or a JIHADIST being trained by Los Zetas...are we not lucky or what to have Open Borders Criminal ILLEGALS the Plague being rewarded while we go bankrupt and our family, neighbors, friends are sent aas US Military overseases on foreign soil to be systematically sacrificed for the NUMBERS USA CRIMINALS due to Open BOrders and TREASON WITHIN...WAR has been delcared upon us dba the USA if you don't know it--you are part of the problem..
It's Jail...it's supposed to be tough, next time we will keep you at the Plaza Hotel near Central Park and provide a free carriage ride. Boo hoo, I am tone deaf to illegal immigrants making demands on us and our piss pants politicians bowing to their demands.
I am on the verge of NEVER voting in an election again, it's no need...the politicians democrat and repulican aren't going to do anything at all, America has been soft since Reagan left office AND I AM A DEMOCRAT...
I hear you but even Reagan amnestied millions of illegals - thus providing encouragement for the 30 million or so illegals that have come since the '86 amnesty.
Both parties don't care about Americans.
You are absolutely correct, I forgot the Mariel Boatlift...Castro was smart to unleash his mental hospitals and prisons. And yes, Republicans and Democrats are all talk and no action on illegals, if I was an illegal I would come over here, heck at least in prison you get 3 squares, medical care, etc...it's a good deal.
The 1986 amnesty was Ted Kennedy's idea, and strictly enforcing existing immigration laws from then forward, promised by the Simpson-Mazzoli Act, was supposed to be part of the deal. So Reagan (who later said it was the biggest mistake he made) and Congress (Dems and Repubs alike) went along and gave amnesty to almost 3 million illegal aliens, sending the message, that if you can steal in and stay long enough, the Americans will reward your illegal acts by giving you amnesty. How strong was that message? We now have 4 times as many, or more, wanting amnesty.
Could we send them to Quantanamo? Not watch too closely? If they decide to escape, let Castro deal with 'em. It will be the first immigrants there in a long time.
The system of immigration detentions centers in the US should concern us all. Bad stories and miscarriage of justice are just starting to become public knowledge and few including myself really care to think about it. Therefore, it should be made a congressional duty to inspect each of these facilities and conduct sample interviews to make sure our treatment of the "illegals" does not slip into something really unfortunate or bad.
"congressional duty"? Seriously?
Those morons in DC should be upholding their oath of office and enforcing the existing immigration laws. If they would do that we wouldn't have such an enormous issue with illegals in the first place.
Welcome to National Socialist Amerika!!! Republicans and Tea Party scum, you can print this picture to masturbate to.
It's so annoying and cliche to write "Amerika." Quit it.
And which picture would that be JAY??? A picture of you in the Food Stamp line??? No thanks.
For the person who made the Canada comment about coming here.................. A US Citizen has just as much work to do getting into Canada. It is what it is. I have no sympathy for anyone in this article at all. Break the law, go to jail, suffer consequences. That's life. It's a jail, not a resort. Stop coming here illegally. The court rules now, also in Alabama ~ that the schools have no right to check the legal status of children attending their schools = crowded classrooms grow. This is just utterly ridiculous. Mexico has very strict rules for coming and staying in their country if you're not a citizen as well. The media just propogates!!
BEYOND ALL THIS CHATTER.
Do not violate our laws.
Now if you were here illegally then we have seen that is not a problem.
BUT a felony now that is a different story.
@Tara: Absolutely right re. crossing into Canada for U.S. citizens. I'm 1/2 Canadian, but a passport carrying U.S. citizen by birth and I get hassled every time I try and enter Canada to visit one of my many cousins there.
But this article is about an individual who apparently checked an incorrect box of Citizen affirmation on a state driver's license and was imprisoned for a fairly long time inside what appears to be a broken system. Inside the story details he has a green card allowing him to stay, but apparently the flippant driver's license check has tied him up in ugly litigation. Perhaps a lesson for others....
tara riley thank you
good points and all accurate!!
Wah... funny they picked the likely oddest candidate of illegals to evoke some sympathy... tough - no sympathy from me.
Why not do a report on the other 299/300 who you will probably find are Mexicans who drove drunk and killed or maimed someone.