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Hourly Update

Phx. illegal entrants face proportionate rate of criminal charges, stats say

Associated Press
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 02.25.2008
PHOENIX — The crime rate involving undocumented migrants is not as bad as feared according to the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office.
Even with stepped-up enforcement of immigration laws in recent months in Maricopa County, undocumented immigrants are not charged with a disproportionate number of crimes.
According to the sheriff's office, only 10 percent of the people booked into county jails are subject to ICE holds. That means they will be turned over to the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency when their cases are resolved.
The number corresponds closely to the estimated percentage of illegal immigrants thought to live in Maricopa County.
The numbers suggest that illegal immigrants are not charged with crimes any more or less than any other segment of the population. The latest jail figures, which were released after a public-records request by The Arizona Republic, comes as the sheriff's office has intensified its efforts to enforce immigration laws.
The sheriff's office made an agreement with customs enforcement last spring that allows specially trained sheriff's deputies and detention officers to evaluate the immigration status of people they arrest. From that time to the end of 2007, 7,700 out of 76,000 people booked into Maricopa County jails, or just over 10 percent, had ICE holds, according to records.
A November 2007 report by the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that favors immigration control, estimated there are 579,000 undocumented immigrants in Arizona, or 9 percent of the state's population. The concentration of undocumented immigrants is thought to be higher in metropolitan Phoenix.
Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas and others have tried to make a connection between crime and illegal immigration. During a November news conference, Thomas said, "We continue to see the link between our crime rate in the Valley and illegal immigrants. We continue to have a serious violent-crime problem in Arizona, which is directly related to our border situation."
On Friday, Thomas informed The Republic that he had discussed the question sufficiently in the past and later issued a statement. "The link between crime and illegal immigration is well known and was recognized by the 78 percent of Arizonans who voted for Proposition 100 in 2006," it read.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who says he is the only one who enforces immigration laws, did not respond. His public-information officers said late Friday that the office had not reviewed the statistics provided by a chief deputy, who helps oversee the jails.
Critics have targeted Mesa Police Chief George Gascon for publicly saying that immigrants do not commit a disproportionate number of crimes. "Unfortunately, it seems to be an inconvenient truth, because there are so many people making this the central point of a political campaign and a central point of their own political agendas," Gascon said.
"The fact continues to remain that undocumented people here in this country do not commit crimes at any greater rate than any other segment of the population."
Gascon said illegal immigration is a major issue for Arizona and the U.S., but that it does not overlap with the state's crime problems as neatly as some would like to think.
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