"To Deport or Not to Deport--An Arizona Story
By Justin B
Some of you may not be familiar with two Arizona cases going on involving the way that we process illegal immigrants. First, we have the story of four teenage high school students with high marks and who have been in the country for over a decade (illegally).
Four Phoenix students who were apprehended by immigration authorities during a field trip to Niagara Falls three years ago will likely be ordered deported to Mexico at a hearing later this month, their attorney said Wednesday.
The students, who have been in the United States since they were small children, were part of a winning solar energy team and were in Buffalo, N.Y., in June 2002 for an international competition when their teacher took them to Niagara Falls.
Immigration authorities detained and questioned them. At least one student wasn't sure what his legal status was.
Since then, the students, now all in college, have been given several reprieves, but their attorney, Judy Flanagan, said the July 21 hearing will likely result in an order for them to leave the country.
If U.S. Immigration Judge John Richardson orders the students to leave, they will probably need to depart within four months, Flanagan said.
"I'm terrified," said one of the students, Jaime Damian. "It's like throwing me onto the street."
The 20-year-old, who has lived in the United States since he was 5, doesn't know the relatives he would be sent to if deported.
The other three students who face deportation are Yuliana Huicochea, 20; Oscar Corona, 20; and Luis Nava, 21.
These rotten kids come here as young children and spend their entire lives getting good grades and going to college. What is wrong with America to not deport them right away? We want to make sure that the only illegals we release into America without deporting are more like this other Phoenix Resident:
Let's see if I've got this straight.
Four high school students brought here illegally when they were tots. Never in trouble. Get good grades. Build a solar-powered boat and do it so well that they're invited to a competition in upstate New York. Nabbed while sightseeing at Niagara Falls on the U.S.-Canadian border.
One construction worker sneaks across the border. Beats his wife. Steals from his employer. Has three criminal convictions and one alias. advertisement
Four boat builders. One felon. Can you guess which the feds are deporting?
Comes now the explanation for why federal immigration authorities have the time and resources to go after Yuliana Huicochea and her three former classmates at Wilson Charter High School.
It's because they let people like Rodrigo Cervantes Zavala walk the streets.
Now, just nine months after Cervantes Zavala was allowed to go free, three people are dead and two children are missing.
It's enough to make you sick, to watch the vast resources of the United States government go after four kids while ignoring Cervantes Zavala for a decade.
According to court records, the guy was born in Mexico, where he got through sixth grade. He worked for Mesa Insulation Specialists for 10 years before being fired in 2002 over suspicions that he was stealing. He has two misdemeanor assault convictions in Glendale. The first in 1995, after he pushed his common-law wife to the ground and hit her. The second in 1998, when he grabbed her by the hair, punched her in the nose and threw her out the door.
Our hero next comes into the system at 1:40 a.m. on March 31, 2004, when Phoenix police catch him and another man stealing $3,298 worth of material from his former employer. He was charged with three felonies: burglary, theft and a weapons violation stemming from his sawed-off shotgun.
He pleaded guilty to burglary in September on the condition that the other charges be dropped. Under terms of the deal offered by prosecutors, Cervantes Zavala was to get probation, community service and he had to forfeit his sawed-off shotgun.
Records show everybody knew this guy was here illegally. The Probation Department notified both immigration authorities and the judge. "He is working full time in construction in Mesa, Arizona," a presentence investigator wrote. "However, he was unable to provide a name of a company or his supervisor's name as he is in the United States illegally and is paid in cash."
Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Cates sentenced Cervantes Zavala to two years' probation on Oct. 18 and ordered that Immigration and Customs Enforcement be notified. For all the good that did.
Late Sunday, three people were shot to death in Queen Creek and two children were kidnapped. Now, police are searching for the kids' father, Cervantes Zavala.
Cates has retired but Mike Goss, deputy chief of Adult Probation, said the judge would have had no legal right to detain Cervantas Zavala for being here illegally unless ICE put a hold on him.
Russell Ahr, Arizona's ICE spokesman, was attending Tuesday's immigration summit in Flagstaff and said he hasn't yet reviewed the case. "I really don't have any way to explain it at this time," he said.
Meanwhile, Mesa Insulation, the company that employed Cervantes Zavala for 10 years, has not been fined, according to ICE records. In fact, not a single Arizona employer has been fined for hiring undocumented immigrants since 2001. Not one.
This guy just killed three people in their home. He was a convicted criminal. Several times over. We let him remain in the country yet deport hard working folks whose only crime was having parents who came to this country illegally. These kids did nothing wrong.
This is the kind of fixing that INS needs. They need someone to ask how we are using our resources. I don't see the purpose of diverting resources to booting kids out when there are over 10 million illegals roaming around. We have to prioritize and the fact that this clown who showed a history of robbery and assault and was not deported immediately but was released back into the public, yet these four kids are getting booted shows there is a huge problem with how our resources are deployed.
So the question is if this murdering illegal is not deported, what about the next one from Pakistan or Iran? How did we miss deporting this guy?"
billroggio.com |
