POL POSITION:Illegal immigration plan shown to work well

With state courts threatening to release prisoners if prison conditions are not improved, illegal immigrants are a major tax on our scarce criminal justice resources. The number of illegal immigrants being arrested is on the rise; it is taking a toll on our local law enforcement; and the expenses associated with arresting and incarcerating this particular set of criminals is astonishing. The most recent figure from the Bureau of Justice Statistics has estimated the cost at $624 million to state prisons. It is absolutely unacceptable for local communities to have to bear the burden of this problem when it has clearly been created by the federal government’s failure to secure our borders.

So far this year in Orange County, there have been 425 illegal immigrants arrested for felonies, 56 of which were aggravated felonies, such as rape. There were also 214 arrests for misdemeanors and an additional 54 arrests for gang-related crimes. During the month of January, 57 out of the 441 individuals arrested in Costa Mesa were illegal immigrants. It is interesting to note that all but one had come from Mexico or some other country in South America. Moreover, most had slipped illegally into our country by simply walking across our porous border with Mexico.

Thanks to an innovative program in Costa Mesa, however, a hold order was placed on many of the arrested illegal immigrants by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). These criminals will no longer be free to return to our streets and communities to commit new crimes. Instead, they will be deported once their criminal charges have been cleared.

The ability to deport these criminals is the result of a new screening program that has recently been implemented in the jails run by Costa Mesa and Orange County. This new program requires jail deputies to screen all foreign nationals for immigration violations. The efforts of Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Mansoor have allowed for a federal officer to be present at the jail at all times.

In the Orange County jails, Sheriff Mike Carona has cross-deputized 25 of his officers so they may serve as both California peace officers and federal immigration officers. This allows illegal immigrants to be legally detained and held for deportation. These actions are an example of local governments being forced to roll up their sleeves and intervene where the feds have failed.

The failure of the federal government to control our borders and the lack of reimbursement from the federal government for costs associated with illegal immigration is pushing local governments to the fiscal breaking point. In California alone, the costs associated with the education, criminal justice resources and medical care of illegal immigrants have reached an estimated $10 billion a year.

As we all know, illegal immigrants, by their very definition, have committed a crime. They have entered this country illegally and illegally remain here. The crimes committed by illegal immigrants, however, could be completely preventable if we, as a nation, had control over our borders.

While the federal government sticks its head in the sand and does nothing about this problem, it is indeed refreshing to see that local officials have. Persons like Sheriff Carona and Mayor Mansoor have been able to bring some reasonable solutions to the problem. We should commend them for their single-handed efforts to combat the problem of illegal immigrant criminals.