Feds tout deportation of criminals from Washington state

A stepped-up effort to deport immigrants who commit crimes from the United States is being touted by immigration officials who check jails, juvenile centers and courts across Washington.

Since the campaign began in June, 4,453 legal and illegal immigrants around the state have been ordered into removal proceedings. Criminals accounted for about a third of all immigrants who were expelled from the Pacific Northwest and the U.S overall last year.

To give higher priority to the campaign, known as the Criminal Alien Program, the agency moved it last year from the investigations division to the detention and removal section.

"It's turning out great results," said A. Neil Clark, field director for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

"Our primary focus is providing safety and security for law-abiding citizens and legal residents of this country," Clark said. "We want these people off the streets."

Response from local jurisdictions to the effort ranges from full cooperation to tolerance.

Federal investigators start by trying to identify deportable immigrants who have been arrested and obtain holds on them while they are in jail. Some post bail before a hold can be obtained, and immigration officials sometimes try to apprehend them in court, causing friction in at least one case.

In a posting on an e-mail list for municipal and district judges, Mason County District Judge Victoria C. Meadows complained about immigration officers appearing outside her courtroom two weeks in a row, checking her foreign-language calendar and asking her Spanish interpreter to identify a defendant who was scheduled to appear.

The interpreter declined.

Meadows said the effort could cause fewer defendants to make their court dates.

"I have a very good appearance record," she said. "I don't want to interfere with ICE's work, but we also don't want them interfering with the court process."

Clark said the immigration officials try to work closely with courts and local enforcement agencies.

The officers in Meadows' court, he said, were seeking two illegal immigrants who faced felony charges of re-entering the U.S. illegally after being deported. Both had posted bail and were given a court date after being arrested by local authorities for a different crime.

"We deemed them a priority," Clark said.

Neither appeared. Meadows said at least one took off after recognizing the immigration officers.

Anti-illegal immigration activists say the feds should do more to apprehend deportable immigrants.

They cite high-profile cases such as Terapon Adhahn, an immigrant from Thailand sentenced recently to life in prison for the kidnap, rape and murder last year of a Tacoma girl; Jonathan Rowan, a Briton subject who was living in the U.S. illegally when he fatally shot his girlfriend at the University of Washington last spring; and Joseph Njonge, an immigrant from Kenya charged with strangling a 75-year-old woman outside her husband's nursing home in Federal Way in March.

"You commit a crime, I don't care if you're here legally or not," said Leon Donahue of Washingtonians for Immigration Reform. "We want you out of the country."

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Information from: The Seattle Times, http://www.seattletimes.com