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Politics : Piffer Thread on Political Rantings and Ravings -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Original Mad Dog who wrote (1474)	9/27/2001 11:30:09 PM
From: Alan Smithee	Respond to of 14610

OMD - An article in yesterday's LA Times addresses this issue and the government' use of immigration and other laws to detain people without charging them. It appears most people are being held under immigration statutes, which allow for detention of illegal aliens, or under procedures for holding material witnesses. The story: latimes.com As you noted, if someone enters the country illegally, they have no right to be here and can be detained until they can be deported. The "material witness" cases present different problems, but I suspect those are in the minority. Until June of this year, the INS used §241(a)(6) of the Immigration and Nationality Act to detain certain individuals indefinitely. The individuals detained had typically been convicted of felonies and had served their time. On release, they were not deportable because the countries they came from and were citizens of either no longer existed, or would not take them back. In Zadvydas v. Davis, the Supreme Court held that indefinite detention violated the due process clause of the Constitution. The court established a six-month period as being reasonable to detain someone following release from his or her sentence. After that time, if the alien can show there is no significant likelihood of removal from the country in the "reasonably forseeable future," the burden shifts to the government to show that removal will take place in the "reasonably forseeable future." supct.law.cornell.edu My feelings about this are that these are difficult times and in times like these, some individual rights have to give way. The people who attacked made clear that they won't stop in their jihad with the West. I have no doubt that if they have the ability to do so, the will use nuclear, chemical and biological weapons against us. Next time, instead of 7,000 deaths, it may be 70,000. Faced with that prospect, my belief is that I would rather see a few innocent people detained for a time to allow the government to root out the ones that do intend to do us harm. It's tough, but it has to be done. As an aside, when I walked by the Federal Courthouse today on the way to my car, Fox and the other networks were outside with camera crews. Apparently, they were holding a detention hearing for the 4 people who were arrested yesterday on charges dealing with fraudulently obtaining Hazmat endorsements on their licenses. That sight really brought this home to me. I have to keep in mind that the Judge who presided over the Ressam trial is in that Courthouse and the US Attorney's office that prosecuted him is a stone's throw from where I work.

To: Original Mad Dog who wrote (1474)	9/27/2001 11:36:37 PM
From: MulhollandDrive	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 14610

Yes, that's what I was saying a couple of posts back, if they are illegal, they can be deported, but I thought Smoothsail was questioning whether or not we could detain them on that basis (illegal status, while "suspecting" they may be terrorists). So the question is, for example, if we have an illegal in the country and they are arrested under suspicion of another crime, but are not subsequently charged with that crime due to insufficient evidence, should they not be deported under the law? I am assuming the answer to that is yes. After much delay and legal maneuvers.