http://www.haitiantimes.com myBloggie - Open Source Weblog http://backend.userland.com/rss http://mybloggie.mywebland.com/?v=2.1.6 http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=39 01 Mar 2008 01:07:11 am GMT + General http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=39 NEW YORK (AP) — Immigrants seeking legal status in the United States are being victimized with disturbing frequency by their lawyers, a federal appeals panel said. After criticizing the work done and not done by defense lawyers, the three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan took aim at the government, scolding its lawyers for quibbling over irrelevant language in one case in a quest to win. Victimized by the failures of lawyers on both sides are the immigrants, "a vulnerable population who come to this country searching for a better life and often arrive unfamiliar with our language and culture, in economic deprivation and in fear," the court wrote in an opinion released Wednesday. "In immigration matters, so much is at stake — the right to remain in this country, to reunite a family or to work," the court said. Essentially saying in legal jargon that it was fed up, the appeals court ordered the case of a Jamaican immigrant, Garfield Livern St. Valentine Aris, reopened. Aris, who entered the United States at age 12 in 1983, was a lawful immigrant who supported his wife and stepdaughter and had no close family members in Jamaica, the court said. He pleaded guilty in August 1991 to a cocaine possession charge and was sentenced to three years' probation and fined $1,000. Afterward, federal authorities ordered deportation proceedings to begin because of his conviction. The appeals court said Aris' lawyers "failed spectacularly" once he was victimized by a simple error: A paralegal told him it appeared his hearing was not scheduled on the day that it was. When he didn't show up, he was ordered deported on May 3, 1995. The appeals court said that the law firm never told him the hearing had occurred and that he had been ordered deported. In June 2005, he learned there was a deportation order against him. When he hired new lawyers, they filed flawed documents on his behalf, the appeals court said. As a result, he was detained for nine months, and, without his income, his wife and stepdaughter could not afford to pay rent and were forced to move to a homeless shelter. The appeals panel said in a footnote that it seemed Aris had a compelling argument to remain in the United States because of "social and humane considerations," including the relatively minor nature of his drug offense and because his family is in the country. The appeals court said it was troubled that, during arguments before it, a government lawyer failed to recognize that it did not matter whether the paralegal who misinformed Aris told him "you do not have a hearing" or "our records indicate that you do not have a hearing scheduled." The court noted that Aris, who has not been deported, was an immigrant with limited familiarity with U.S. immigration law. "When lawyers representing immigrants fail to live up to their professional obligations, it is all too often the immigrants they represent who suffer the consequences," the appeals court wrote. "We appreciate that, unfortunately, calendar mishaps will from time to time occur. But the failure to communicate such mistakes, once discovered, to the client and to take all necessary steps to correct them is more than regrettable — it is unacceptable. It is nondisclosure that turns the ineffective assistance of a mere scheduling error into more serious malpractice." The court noted the role of government, as well. "Governmental authorities, whatever their roles, must be attentive to such lapses that so grievously undermine the administration of justice," the appeals panel said. NEW YORK (AP) — Immigrants seeking legal status in the United States are being victimized with disturbing frequency by their lawyers, a federal appeals panel said. After criticizing the work done and not done by defense lawyers, the three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ......

]]> http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=39 http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=38 02 Feb 2008 11:07:14 pm GMT + General http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=38 NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — A law school and a newspaper on Monday sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to obtain documents regarding what they said were warrantless raids on the homes of immigrants. Seton Hall Law School and the Brazilian Voice, both based in Newark, said they sued because the department rejected expedited processing of their request for the records, which was filed Dec. 14 with the department under the Freedom of Information Act. Seton Hall and the newspaper said the department rejected expedited processing by asserting the raids were not of particular public interest because "a preliminary search of the Internet does not indicate that there is substantial current news interest concerning this topic." A message seeking comment from Homeland Security was not immediately returned. The school and the Brazilian Voice, a Portuguese-language paper, said they believe there have been more than 40 immigration raids in New Jersey since January 2006 under "Operation Return to Sender." They seek records about them and the policies and procedures for the raids. The raids are done by agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, an agency within Homeland Security. "Many victims of the raids believe they were duped or coerced into opening their door to ICE agents, and still have no idea why their family was targeted. Often the individuals arrested in a raid have lived in the U.S. for years, raised U.S.-citizen children, worked hard, paid taxes and established community ties," said Bassina Farbenblum, a lawyer with the school’s Center for Social Justice. ICE arrested 2,079 people in the raids last year, of which 87 percent had no criminal record, according to agency statistics cited by the school and newspaper. NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — A law school and a newspaper on Monday sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to obtain documents regarding what they said were warrantless raids on the homes of immigrants. Seton Hall Law School and the Brazilian Voice, both based in Newark, said they sued because ......

]]> http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=38 http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=37 10 Jan 2008 05:06:47 am GMT + General http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=37 WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — When Air Force veteran Marcos Miranda had his identity stolen, he went from being a valued customer and employee to a government statistic — one of thousands of identity theft victims caught up each year in the crackdown on illegal immigrants. Identity theft has been a growing worry nationwide, but a rise in federal prosecutions against illegal immigrants offers a new wrinkle to the problem. As the government develops more sophisticated electronic employment verification systems, illegal immigrants are assuming real names and Social Security numbers of U.S. citizens like Miranda to thwart detection at workplaces, to get driver's licenses and to obtain credit. Miranda first learned someone else was using his identity in 2000 when he was arrested on a warrant for unpaid traffic tickets at the border after a visit to relatives in Mexico. The 24-year-old Texas man was released after paying a $340 fine for violations he never incurred. Although his money was eventually returned, his nightmare was just beginning. Since then, Miranda has responded to repeated letters from the Internal Revenue Service demanding thousands of dollars in back taxes for wages paid to someone using his name and Social Security number to work at Oldham's LLC, a pork slaughterhouse in Holton. Miranda watched his once-high credit rating plummet as creditors reported unpaid bills incurred by others. "Even though I am Hispanic, I am against illegal immigration," Miranda said. "Even though a lot of them come to work, there are always bad apples. (Identity theft) has really made my perspective ... negative about immigration." In a deal with federal prosecutors, a Mexican national accused of stealing Miranda's identity pleaded guilty last month to one count of using fraudulent documents. Joel Rojas-Morales, 27, will be sentenced in March. "That way he knows crime doesn't pay in America. Maybe in Mexico it does. But here, it may take some time, but the long arm of the law catches up to you," Miranda said. Chris Joseph, the defense attorney representing Rojas-Morales, is sympathetic to identity theft victims like Miranda. "I have no reason to doubt that is absolutely true. There is no question he is a victim of identity theft," Joseph said. "The question is: Who did the victimizing intentionally? Generally speaking, people who come into the United States don't go out and steal an identity. They generally purchase a set of identity documents for the purpose of being able to work." Illegal immigrants who buy documents often are reassured by sellers that the identity they're getting belongs to someone who no longer works in this country, who sold his identity papers, who died or who never existed. "The person naively purchases the papers believing they are not doing any harm," Joseph said. Prosecutors said Rojas-Morales worked under a false identity at Oldham's since 2004, using a fraudulent Colorado driver's license, a bogus Social Security card and other phony employment forms. Based on Miranda's account of his identity theft problems, Joseph said, it's likely several people were using his identity. Joseph declined to talk specifically about his client's ongoing criminal case or allow him to be interviewed. The government has "no solid numbers" showing either an increase or decrease in immigration-related identity theft cases nationwide, said Betsy Broder, assistant director in the division of privacy and identity protection at the Federal Trade Commission. But she said the agency has seen a rise in prosecutions of workers using other people's information to be employed, particularly for using fraudulent Social Security numbers. By far the largest workplace enforcement to date was the December 2006 raid at six plants owned by Swift & Co. in which 1,282 illegal immigrants were arrested. Statistics show the number of immigration-related criminal cases filed by U.S. Attorney Eric Melgren's office in Wichita more than tripled between fiscal years 2002 and 2006, peaking at 161 by 2006 in Kansas as the Department of Justice stepped up prosecutions for fraudulent documents and identity theft. By 2007, the number slipped to 100 in the state. "Certainly there has been far more activity starting with action in the Swift packing plant and a number of actions brought by the Department of Homeland Security on these workplace issues," Broder said. An FTC survey released last month showed identity theft for employment purposes accounts for about 1 percent of identity theft cases nationwide, for an estimated 83,000 employment-related identity theft victims in 2005. People using a fraudulent identity to work often use it to also obtain utility services, government benefits, medical care and credit. Credit card fraud is the most common form of identity theft. Based on the number of identity theft complaints reported to the FTC in 2006, states bordering Mexico led the nation in identity theft victims per population. Arizona ranked first, followed by Nevada, California, Texas and Florida. That data showed 246,035 identity theft victims nationwide who reported at least one type of identity theft to the FTC in 2006. Employment-related fraud accounted for 14 percent of the complaints nationwide and about 11 percent of those reported by Kansas victims. Kansas ranked 29th in the nation with 1,626 identity theft victims who filed complaints in 2006, the FTC data showed. Missouri ranked 21st with 3,753. As Rojas-Morales sits in jail in Kansas, the real Marcos Miranda is slowly rebuilding his life in El Paso, Texas, where he works as a truck driver for Swift. Miranda has a new Social Security number and has signed up for a credit monitoring service. "That way," he said, "I can get back on track and get my credit back and do what I have to do to keep my identity to myself." WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — When Air Force veteran Marcos Miranda had his identity stolen, he went from being a valued customer and employee to a government statistic — one of thousands of identity theft victims caught up each year in the crackdown on illegal immigrants. Identity theft has been a ......

]]> http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=37 http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=36 20 Dec 2007 04:47:47 am GMT + General http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=36 At opposite sides of New Hampshire, John McCain faced two corporate audiences in two college towns earlier this month. Only one topic came up in both places when he starting taking questions: illegal immigration. The Republican presidential hopeful gets so many questions — sometimes hostile — about immigration at his town hall meetings that he quips, "This meeting is adjourned," before explaining his position at length. It was the first question asked when he visited the spacious headquarters of C&S Wholesale Grocers, a multibillion-dollar grocery supplier in Keene. A day earlier, an employee at a gleaming printing press manufacturer in Durham appeared skeptical after hearing him explain his stance, which prompted McCain to give her a chance to respond. "I just think it's not fair to all the people who came here legally and went through the process and now all the illegals, you're just gonna give ‘em citizenship?" she said. "That's not fair." In a recent Associated Press-Pew Research Center poll, 17 percent of likely Republican voters in the New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation presidential primary named illegal immigration as the one issue they want to hear candidates talk about, making it second only to Iraq. In Iowa, where caucuses kick of the presidential nominating season, immigration was the leading issue for 18 percent of Republicans, ahead of Iraq. The figures are somewhat surprising in New Hampshire, a state of 1.3 million people with a small immigrant population and even smaller illegal one. There were 14,000 more foreign-born residents in the state last year than in 2000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. A report last year by the Pew Hispanic Center estimated the state is home to somewhere between 10,000 and 30,000 illegal immigrants. Andrew Smith, director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center, said he has believed for a year or so that illegal immigration would be important in the GOP primary because it strikes so many chords. There's the economic argument: Illegal immigrants are taking jobs from Americans. There's the legal one: They're breaking the law. There's the cultural argument: They're not assimilating into American culture. And then there's what Smith calls the "racial overlay." "You've got all these different facets of this issue, which is just primed and ready to go off," said Smith, whose most recent poll also had immigration as the number two issue for New Hampshire Republicans. It doesn't matter that New Hampshire has little direct experience. "It's the kind of issue that you don't have to be impacted by it personally to be concerned about," Smith said. JoAnn Sherman, 54, of New Boston, N.H., considers illegal immigration second in importance only to the war on terrorism. Though she says she welcomes legal immigrants who assimilate into American culture, she feels strongly about illegal immigration. "It's costing those of us who work and pay taxes millions and millions of dollars to support these people who shouldn't be here in the first place," she said. "They're getting free health care, they're getting schooling for their children. Yes, they're working, but they're not paying taxes. They're here, and being a drain more than they're producing." "And it goes along with the terror issue because it's telling us we don't know who's in this country," she said. GOP state chairmen in both New Hampshire and Iowa say concerns about national security have made illegal immigration a top issue in their states. "People are worried about not just illegal immigrants that can come over from Mexico, they just can come over from all over the world," said Iowa chairman Ray Hoffman. "I think this is their fear of the safety of our country." Sherman plans to vote for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in New Hampshire's Jan. 8 primary partly because of his stance on illegal immigration. Romney has proposed bolstering border patrols, creating employment eligibility cards and penalizing employers who hire illegal aliens who lack the cards. He also has criticized rival Rudy Giuliani for discouraging the prosecution of illegal immigrants while he was mayor of New York — an accusation Giuliani deflected in a recent debate by pointing out that Romney had illegal immigrants work on his lawn. Romney, who leads in New Hampshire in the AP poll but faces a surging former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Iowa, is seen by Republicans in both states as the candidate best able to handle illegal immigration. Huckabee recently released his own immigration plan, which takes a tough stance similar to those taken by Romney and other GOP rivals. But Huckabee has been more forgiving in the past of some here illegally: As Arkansas governor, he attempted to make children of illegal immigrants eligible for scholarships and in-state college tuition. Huckabee defends those moves. "In all due respect, we are a better country than to punish children for what their parents did," he said last month. Last week, Romney began airing the first negative ad of his campaign in Iowa, criticizing Huckabee's record on immigration. "Mitt Romney stood up, and vetoed in-state tuition for illegal aliens, opposed driver's licenses for illegals. Mike Huckabee? Supported in-state tuition benefits for illegal immigrants. Huckabee even supported taxpayer-funded scholarships for illegal aliens. On immigration, the choice matters," the ad's narrator intones. McCain, meanwhile, has regained some of the support he lost last spring when he was pushing a comprehensive immigration bill that ultimately failed in Congress. He still supports a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, but has emphasized recently that securing the borders must come first. Sherman said she appreciates McCain's new attitude. "Senator McCain learned the hard way that his approach was not the right one," she said. In Durham, McCain told the skeptical employee at Goss International that under his bill, illegal immigrants seeking to become citizens would have had to pay fines and get in line behind those here legally. But he also offered a broader perspective. "They are God's children. They are human beings. Many of them come just because they need a job. And I think many of them, as you know, are badly exploited and mistreated by these coyotes and others," he said. At opposite sides of New Hampshire, John McCain faced two corporate audiences in two college towns earlier this month. Only one topic came up in both places when he starting taking questions: illegal immigration. The Republican presidential hopeful gets so many questions — sometimes hostile ......

]]> http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=36 http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=35 22 Nov 2007 04:37:10 am GMT + General http://www.haitiantimes.com/php/myside/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=35 WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday came out against granting driver's licenses to illegal immigrants, after weeks of pressure in the Democratic 2008 presidential race to take a position on a now-failed ID plan from her home state governor. Clinton, the frontrunning Democrat, has faced criticism from candidates in both parties for her noncommittal answers on New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's attempt to allow illegal immigrants in his state to receive driver's licenses. Spitzer abandoned the effort Wednesday. "I support Governor Spitzer's decision today to withdraw his proposal," Clinton said in a statement. "As president, I will not support driver's licenses for undocumented people and will press for comprehensive immigration reform that deals with all of the issues around illegal immigration including border security and fixing our broken system." Clinton stumbled when asked about the issue during a Democratic debate two weeks ago, and her new position comes the day before another debate where opponents are expected to raise the issue again. Rival campaigns made clear they were not letting go of the issue. "When it takes two weeks and six different positions to answer one question on immigration, it's easier to understand why the Clinton campaign would rather plant their questions than answer them," said Sen Barack Obama's spokesman Bill Burton. Colleen Flanagan, a spokesman for Sen. Chris Dodd, called Clinton's position "flip-flopping cubed. She was for it before she was against it, before she was for it, before she was against it." Spitzer met with New York lawmakers in Washington on Wednesday, and conceded that there was too much public opposition to his plan. Clinton did not attend the meeting. WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday came out against granting driver's licenses to illegal immigrants, after weeks of pressure in the Democratic 2008 presidential race to take a position on a now-failed ID plan from her home state governor. Clinton, the frontrunning Democrat, ......

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