House Votes to Put More INS Agents at Jails

WASHINGTON —  The House voted Tuesday to station INS agents in at least 10 local jails across the country next year, based on the success of a pilot program in Anaheim and Ventura County jails that ferreted out more than 2,600 illegal immigrants accused of crimes during the last year.

The program aims to have Immigration and Naturalization Service agents in 100 local jails by 2002 and will cost about $84 million over four years, officials said. It is part of the federal government’s crackdown on illegal immigration, particularly the deportation of convicted criminals.

Under the pilot program in Anaheim and Ventura County, some illegal immigrants were deported upon their arrest, while others were monitored as their cases proceeded through the courts. Those convicted of serious crimes serve their sentences before being deported.

The bill passed 410-2 with overwhelming bipartisan support.

However, similar legislation has not yet been introduced in the Senate, so the expansion of the program cannot be finalized until early next year.

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Proponents, led by Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley) and several other California conservatives, said that in many cases, identifying suspects as illegal immigrants before they are arraigned and then deporting them has the triple benefit of ousting illegal immigrants, removing criminals from local communities and saving taxpayers the cost of incarceration.

“It does not surprise me that those who would not respect our immigration laws will disregard the civil and criminal laws of our country as well,” Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach) said during the debate.

On the floor, Gallegly told of the 1996 slaying of Isabela Guzman, the owner of La Playita restaurant in Santa Paula, by an illegal immigrant who had been arrested three times before. He argued that the woman would still be alive had there been an INS agent in the Ventura County Jail to snare her killer during his previous arrests.

“How do you oppose deporting people who are committing crimes, from burglary to rape and robbery and murder?” he asked in an interview.

Launched after the 1995 shooting of a police officer by an illegal immigrant, the Anaheim program netted about 1,800 undocumented immigrants--18% of all suspects arrested by the Police Department--between Jan. 1 and Oct. 1 of this year, authorities said. Illegal immigrants were suspects in 62% of Anaheim’s hit-and-run traffic violations, 53% of its rapes, 32% of sexual abuse crimes and 22% of the city’s slayings, authorities said.

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During previous study periods in the program, illegal immigrants accounted for as many as 24% and 35% of those arrested and held at the Anaheim City Jail.

In Ventura County, INS agents identified 847 illegal immigrants booked on charges ranging from shoplifting to murder over a period of 11 months--about 10% of those arrested and brought to the jail.

The bill could place agents in up to 25 counties next year, and then add 25 each subsequent year until 2002. One-fifth of the counties must be in nonborder states.

Elliott Zaret of States News Service contributed to this report.