A new report charges that Federal immigration authorities are more likely to incarcerate cannabis users than rapists and murderers. (Photo/my_southborough via Flickr)
A new report from the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice (CJCJ) — a nonprofit that works to reduce incarceration rates — alleges that more undocumented immigrants in the U.S. are likely to be deported for a minor marijuana possession conviction than rape or murder.
Examining California data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which is part of the Department of Homeland Security, from October 2009 to February 2013, CJCJ reported that a bulk of ICE’s hold requests were issued for people who had no recorded criminal histories or who were arrested for low-priority marijuana offenses.
According to the CJCJ report, around one-fifth of people ICE has placed a hold request on had a prior conviction that included a violent offense such as rape or murder. All others — the remaining four-fifths — had other crimes on their records such as drug, property, immigration, procedural and minor traffic offenses or drunk driving.
Specifically those suspected of being an undocumented immigrant with a marijuana possession charge were booked in an ICE detention center 73.1 percent of the time, compared with 69.7 percent for those who had been convicted of rape.
Hold requests or detainer requests issued by ICE allow a law enforcement agency to hold a person in custody for up to 48 hours without a warrant, while that person’s immigration status in the U.S. is investigated.
As Mint Press News previously reported, this policy has largely been criticized by immigrant-rights advocates who say that the practice discourages communities of immigrants from having a cooperative relationship with law enforcement officials. As a result, some local police departments throughout the U.S. actually have publicly stated that they will not comply with the hold requests issued by ICE.
In 2011, President Obama’s then-Director of Intergovernmental Affairs Cecilia Muñoz wrote in a blog post that the Department of Homeland Security had “prioritized the removal of people who have been convicted of crimes in the United States,” consistent with “a strategy to make sure we use those resources in a way that puts public safety and national security first.”
In response to the report, Gillian Christensen, a spokesperson for ICE, said that the agency
“places detainers on individuals arrested on criminal charges to ensure that dangerous criminal aliens and other priority individuals are not released from prisons and jails into our communities. ICE officers also consider other enforcement priorities when making decisions to place immigration detainers such as if the individual is a recent border crosser, immigration fugitive or has been previously removed from the United States, a federal felony.”
But,
“according to these data, an undocumented foreign national with a traffic offense is more likely to be booked into ICE detention than one with a homicide, forcible rape, robbery, or aggravated assault offense. For example, of the 741 holds with a prior or current homicide offense, 440 were booked into detention.
“If this is the case then immigration and customs enforcement operates erratically, applying scarce detention space and resources to suspected undocumented immigrants with the least or no criminal records while allowing one-third of individuals convicted of murder, rape, kidnapping, and terrorism to be released from custody.”
ICE concluded that “it does not seem plausible that officials would detain lesser offenders more than more serious ones, given detainer program stated priorities,” and said the findings required further examination.
When asked about the report, ICE told Salon that because the report “only focuses on detainers issued on convicted criminals,” it “fails to recognize the issuance of ICE detainers on other public safety threats such as transnational criminal street gang members, international fugitives, human rights violators, national security threats and those who repeatedly violate our immigration laws.”
The agency also said the report “does not take into account detainers placed on immigration law violators charged with serious crimes who have not yet been convicted of a crime in the United States,” and that the report failed to take into consideration that some people who are detained are ultimately released.
Minor marijuana infractions
Concerning for the California-based CJCJ is that persons are being arrested for minor marijuana possession at all, since in California possessing less than an ounce of marijuana is not a crime after the state decriminalized the possession of small amounts of marijuana in 1973 and legalized medical marijuana in 1996.
The group’s frustration is not because it is sympathetic to efforts to legalize marijuana, but is instead related to the concerns about the sheer numbers of people the U.S. incarcerates.
As Mint Press News previously reported, the U.S. incarcerates more people than any other nation in the world. The nation with the second-highest incarceration rate is Rwanda, followed by Cuba and Russia. Though the U.S. is home to less than 5 percent of the world’s population, 25 percent of the world’s incarcerated population is in the U.S. And as opponents of the private prison industry have continually stressed, most people behind bars have committed low-level, non-violent crimes, particularly drug and property offenses.
On average, the cost of putting a person behind bars in a California jail for just one day is $114. The authors of the CJCJ report said because of the high cost of incarceration, the criminal justice system should differentiate between low-risk and high-risk offenders and “place them in the least restrictive settings necessary to protect public safety.
The authors went on to say that while ICE has been directed by the Secure Communities Program to prioritize the “removal of criminal aliens, those who pose a threat to public safety, and repeat immigration violators,” an analysis of ICE holds requests found that many of the requests were issued for persons who have no criminal history or who had previously been arrested for low-priority marijuana offense.
As a result, CJCJ has encouraged county law enforcement officials to cease complying with ICE’s hold requests “in order to better manage already strained jail capacities,” and reminded ICE about its pledge to deprioritize immigration enforcement for youth.
Legalization only a matter of time
Ben Livingston said it best in a blog post he wrote for the San Francisco Chronicle, when he wrote, “This land is my land, this land is your land, but the settler who smokes some weed will get banned.”
He referenced a study from the state of Washington that found that its citizens will need to smoke around 123 joints per year to rake in the most tax money that will fund drug education programs, health care, and early childhood learning programs, among others. Washington state legalized the recreational use of marijuana last November. Livingston also urged the Obama administration to “send your immigrant pot detainees to Washington state,” so federal officials can focus more on violent crimes such as murder and rape:
“Cannabis tourism is poised to dramatically increase travel-related revenue in Washington State and Colorado. These two states should make it known to the world that we want your weed money. At the same time, we should make it clear that we don’t want the feds threatening to deport our pot smokers.”
Talking to federal officials in a tongue-in-cheek manner, Livingston added that “if federal officials want the [marijuana] offenders under ‘community supervision’ for some time to make sure their weed habit doesn’t lead to actual crime like rape and murder, Washington state has this infrastructure in place.”
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