The News & Observer has a story this morning about how mean old probation officers are working with federal immigration officials to entrap illegals who are on probation for various crimes. Once entrapped, the paper says, the illegals are put on the track for deportation.
The N&O conflates illegal immigrants with law-breaking illegal immigrants (not counting the immigration laws they’ve broken just by being here, that is), just as many conflate immigration with illegal immigration.. It’s not hard to see where the N&O reporters stand on this (the probationees are “herded,” the new policy contrasts with the old aim to “build trust” with illegal-immigrant criminals). They seem to view the whole thing as very unfair to the entrapped criminals. I’m sure an editorial saying just that is being written as we speak.
Backers of the policy point out that illegal immigrant criminals take up probation officer time and other finite and expensive social services.
Robert Guy, director of North Carolina’s Division of Community Corrections, which oversees the state’s probation officers, said he is happy to help. He said illegal immigrants are taxing the state’s scarce resources, taking seats in drug treatment programs and overloading probation officers’ calendars.
“They have all broken the law,” Guy said. “If they are here illegally and that’s detected, we have an obligation to report that to the feds.”
One person caught in the probation trap was on probation for shoplifting, said Tony Asion, of the Hispanic advocacy group El Pueblo.
“People are afraid to go to the grocery store,” Asion said. “People are hiding. … They would love to come here legally, but there’s no way for them.”
I can sympathize. I fear mistaken arrest for shoplifting every time I go to the mall. It happens all the time. That’s why I hide in my home rather than go shopping. I also don’t drive anymore because I might be mistakenly arrested for drunk driving, or for driving without a license, or for driving with expired tags. Instead, I hide in my house all day.
Advice to illegal immigrants: If you want to stay illegal and not get deported, don’t do anything to get arrested for.
