That is crazy stuff. Can't understand how those mistakes can happen.

Looks like his dream of wanting to be a Ruskie was granted (lol). Although not in the context he had wished. A bit embarrassing too. At least he had decent food and warm place to sleep. The comments about not believing him are out of line. Of course anyone locked up will claim innocence. Nothing new there. A normal fubar when the system is setup to detect people claiming to be one of us who are not. But not the other way around. USCIS will need to post notices telling us NOT to say we are Russians unless we are.

By KAREEM FAHIM | NY Times, Jan 24

NEWARK — The editor of a Brazilian community newspaper who said he was detained by the police in September sued the Police Department on Wednesday, saying that his rights were violated when officers demanded that he hand over photographs of a crime scene and handcuffed him to a bench when he refused.

The lawsuit, filed in the Federal District Court, is the latest complaint stemming from the events of Sept. 6, when a freelance photographer with the Portuguese-language paper Brazilian Voice stumbled upon the body of a woman in a trash-strewn alley in the Ironbound district. The photographer took pictures of the body and returned to the newspaper office. Then he and the editor, Roberto Lima, contacted the police.

A police official who came to the scene asked the photographer about his immigration status, violating a state directive that prevents local law enforcement officers from asking the immigration status of witnesses to crimes. In a statement released on Wednesday, the police director, Garry F. McCarthy, said that in response to the photographer’s allegations, the department had started a “more comprehensive training program” and had disciplined the police official, Deputy Chief Samuel A. DeMaio.

In the lawsuit, Mr. Lima, who returned to the alley with the photographer, maintains that Chief DeMaio bullied him and warned him not to publish pictures of the dead woman. He also says Chief DeMaio instructed another officer, Detective Lydell A. James, to seize the camera and an electronic storage card.

The journalists were taken to a police station, according to the lawsuit. When Mr. Lima asked that the camera be returned, he was told he would have to give the police all the copies of the photos taken at the crime scene, according to the suit. He refused, and a police officer handcuffed him to a bench for about half an hour but did not charge him, Mr. Lima says in the lawsuit.

He said he was released only after he accepted the advice of a Municipal Council member for the area, Augusto Amador, who told him to give the police the photos.

In an interview Wednesday, Mr. Lima said, “It’s my right to decide what to print.” The police, he said, detained him simply “because they can do things” without repercussion.

Mr. Lima’s lawsuit, filed by the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union and the Seton Hall University Center for Social Justice, says the Police Department violated state and federal laws, including the First Amendment to the Constitution and a state reporter shield law. The suit seeks compensation and punitive damages.

In the end, Mr. Lima did not publish any photos of the dead woman, he said, because it would have been disrespectful.

In his statement, Mr. McCarthy, the police director, said, “Although I am not at liberty to comment directly on matters concerning open litigation, I can, however, ensure this department’s continued cooperation and adherence to the legal process

NEW YORK (AP) — A man smuggled a monkey onto an airplane Tuesday, stashing the furry fist-size primate under his hat until passengers spotted it perched on his ponytail, an airline official said.
The monkey escapade began in Lima, Peru, late Monday, when the man boarded a flight to Fort Lauderdale, said Spirit Airlines spokeswoman Alison Russell. After landing Tuesday morning, the man waited several hours before catching a connecting flight to LaGuardia Airport.

During the flight, people around the man noticed that the marmoset, which normally lives in forests and eats fruit and insects, had emerged from underneath his hat, Russell said.

"Other passengers asked the man if he knew he had a monkey on him," she said.

The monkey spent the remainder of the flight in the man's seat and behaved well, said Russell, who didn't know how it skirted customs and security.

Airport police were waiting for the man and his monkey when the plane landed about 3 p.m., and the man was taken away for questioning. It was unclear whether he would face any criminal charges.

The city's animal control agency said the monkey appeared healthy. But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was planning to take it for disease testing and keep it quarantined for 31 days, CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said.

If the monkey is healthy, it could wind up in a zoo.

"It is kind of a spirited monkey," Russell said. "That will be the nickname of the monkey: Spirit."
(loooooooooool)

zis is was in the bag lol

Oh Mike

this is too funny. a spirited monkey.

What kind of jacked up security do we have in the airlines??? doesnt give one a warm feeling.

can he adjust his status?lol

quote:

Originally posted by mike_2007:
can he adjust his status?lol

But of course... I am sure he is going to apply for asylum

loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool forever

or maybe VAWA..iam sure they abused the poor thing

By CATHERINE TSAI | Associated Press, 01/28/2008

BOULDER, Colo.—A Wyoming prison parolee has been arrested in the 1997 rape and beating death of a University of Colorado senior after he was linked to the case by a DNA match and other evidence, police said.

Diego Olmos-Alcalde, 38, was being held on $5 million bail on charges of first-degree murder, second-degree kidnapping and first-degree assault in the rape and killing of 23-year-old Susannah Chase of Stamford, Conn., police said.

"The department is ecstatic over this," police Chief Mark Beckner said Sunday.

Chase's family praised investigators in a statement issued at a Sunday news conference.

"As you might imagine our emotions have run the gamut since we first heard of the DNA match with Susannah's case. We are delighted that a suspect has been identified and apprehended," the family said.

Chase was walking home alone early Dec. 21 after an argument with her boyfriend when she was beaten with a baseball bat and left for dead in an alley a block from her home. Police believe the attack was random.

Police never gave up on the case, and interviewed more than 100 people to try to find Chase's killer.

DNA taken from seminal fluid found on Chase's body that was entered into a national DNA database, apparently recently, matched Olmos-Alcalde's, Beckner said. Boulder police learned of the match Thursday.

Beckner said investigators had other information linking Olmos-Alcalde to the attack, but declined to say what information. Olmos-Alcalde had not previously been linked to the case.

Boulder County Jail officials did not make Olmos-Alcalde available for comment by telephone. A jail official did not know whether Olmos-Alcalde had an attorney, and the prosecutor's office was closed Sunday.

Olmos-Alcalde, who is from Chile, went to prison in Wyoming for a kidnapping in 2000 and was released to immigration officials in July 2007, police said.

He failed to report to his Wyoming parole officer and was arrested Saturday by Boulder and Aurora police for violating his parole. Police served Olmos-Alcalde with the murder warrant Sunday.

Investigators were looking into Olmos-Alcalde's immigration status, Beckner said. Police planned to file the arrest warrant affidavit Monday, he said.

Melinda Br***ale of the Wyoming Department of Corrections said Olmos-Alcalde had been sentenced on charges involving kidnapping and terrorizing someone but releasing them without harm.

Lead Detective Chuck Heidel, who had worked the case from the start, broke the news of the DNA match to Chase's mother Friday. "She is extremely happy, she and her family," Heidel said.

Beckner said more investigation remains to clear up questions about the suspect and his whereabouts before the attack.

Boulder police had been widely criticized for failing to solve three murders in the usually peaceful city in the past 25 years, including the murder of child beauty pageant contestant JonBenet Ramsey.

Heidel said Chase's parents have been supportive throughout.

"Because the investigation went down a lot of blind alleys, leading to a lot of dead ends, they went down those with us," said Heidel.

Ron Stump, CU vice chancellor for student affairs, said he hoped the arrest would lead to closure in the death of Chase. "As promised at her memorial, we will continue at CU-Boulder to build, in her memory, a community that strives to eliminate violence in all its forms, but particularly violence against women," he said.

Associated Press, Jan 24

A U.S. Border Patrol agent questioning the occupants of a pickup truck clung to the passenger door and shot and wounded the truck's driver Thursday as the man attempted to flee, authorities said.

The unidentified agent stopped the truck with five people inside about 9:30 a.m. on U.S. 191, nine miles northwest of Douglas, Cochise County Sheriff's spokesman Carol Capas said. The agent was acting on a tip that a truck matching the description and license plate had been seen loading a group of illegal immigrants near Douglas, Capas said.

As the agent stood on the passenger side of the truck, the driver attempted to drive off, with the agent caught in the vehicle's door, Capas said.

"The agent fired a single shot prior to falling off of the door, which struck the driver one time in the leg," Capas said. The agent was dragged about 20 feet before firing his shot, hitting the driver in the upper left leg, Capas added.

The driver — identified as Luis Sanchez-Barron, 29, of Hermosillo, Mexico — stopped a short distance away. He was airlifted to University Medical Center in Tucson, where he was listed in fair condition.

Capas said the other four occupants apparently did not attempt to escape and were taken into custody by the Border Patrol.

Tucson sector Border Patrol spokesman Jesus "Chuy" Rodriguez said he did not know if the five were in the country illegally.

The agent was taken to the Southeastern Arizona Medical Center in Douglas for treatment of cuts and abrasions sustained when he fell from the moving vehicle.

Associated Press, 01/26/2008

AUSTIN—Immigration agents will set up an office at the Travis County Jail to monitor the status of people booked into the facility.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents will likely be stationed in the jail 24 hours a day, seven days a week in coming months, said Travis County Sheriff Greg Hamilton.

Until recently, federal immigration agents visited the jail occasionally to check the immigration status of inmates. They began increasing their presence in the facility late last year, leading to more immigration holds being placed on Travis County inmates for possible deportation, said Adrian Ramirez, assistant director for ICE's San Antonio office.

An immigration hold is a legal order that says a jailed person should be released into ICE custody for possible deportation after completing the sentence.

In some places, including the Dallas County Jail, ICE has officers stationed at detention facilities to handle the process of determining deportability. At the Irving jail and others, jailers can call a 24-hour number and have ICE personnel check databases or speak with detainees to determine if they are legally in the country, said Nuria Prendes, director of detention and removal operations at ICE's Dallas field office.

Austin police have had a yearslong practice of not asking suspects or victims about their immigration status.

Attorney David Peek wrote the sheriff to say he is worried about the new plan because members of the city's immigrant community will think interacting with local law enforcement officers could lead to deportation and become afraid.

Hamilton met with concerned community groups this week and said he decided to allow ICE agents to work out of the jail to improve joint efforts between local and federal law enforcement agencies to increase public safety.

"My contention is that the best way for (undocumented immigrants) to not come under scrutiny is to not commit crimes," he said.

ICE officials decided in October to focus on jails in Travis and Bexar counties. Ramirez said agents also plan to more frequently visit jails throughout his office's 20-county region.

Description: Michael Byers, Canada Research Chair in Global Politics and International Law at the University of British Columbia gives an insightful account of how and why he gave up his US green card.
Date: 21 April 2006
Author:
Source: The Globe and Mail, F6
"This is the first time I've met someone who wanted to do that."
The U.S. immigration officer's southern drawl, so out of place in the Vancouver airport, was accentuated by incredulity.

A "green card," which is actually off-white in colour and called a Permanent Resident Card, provides full rights to enter, live and work in the world's most powerful country. It conveys most of the advantages of U.S. citizenship, so much so that it can be traded in for an American passport after just five years. Yet there I was, 4½ years after I had acquired it, asking for my green card to be taken away.

Acquiring U.S. permanent residency is an arduous process, involving blood tests, chest X-rays and numerous documents, including police certificates attesting to a crime-free past. Even with a prominent sponsor, Duke University, it had taken me three years.

Apart from the 50,000 "diversity immigrants" selected by lottery each year, the 50,000 refugees and the roughly 140,000 who, like me, are targeted for universities and high-tech jobs, most of those who aspire to live and work in the United States have no chance of legally settling there. Still, millions flock to the country, like moths to a flame.

I was on my way to a conference in San Diego when I surrendered my green card. The next morning, out for an early run, I saw scores of Mexican men tending lawns and flowerbeds. Later, a woman from Guatemala cleaned my hotel room. I remembered one of my grad students at Duke, now a law professor in Mexico City, explaining that most of these labourers have forged social-security cards that are convincing enough to protect their employers from the police, while providing no protections for the workers.

Six years ago, Globe and Mail columnist Jeffrey Simpson estimated that 660,000 Canadians were living and working illegally in the United States. Most Canadians blend in easily. But after Sept. 11, 2001, fear replaced curiosity as the standard response to things unknown. Before 9/11, my wife's English accent often generated a friendly response, including the comment "You sound just like Princess Diana." After the attacks, the warm chatter gave way to a strained silence.

At least my princess had a green card and was, therefore, on the legally advantageous side of the divide between "us" and "them." Thousands of men of Arab ethnicity were rounded up and either detained or deported without charge or access to lawyers. Significantly, none of them were citizens or permanent residents of the United States.

Of course, even U.S. citizenship does not provide the protections it once did. In 2002, the Bush administration jailed two Americans without charge or access to lawyers, in direct denial of habeas corpus, a common-law principle that dates back to Magna Carta. And then there is the secret, unconstitutional wiretapping program.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" the immigration officer whispered as she ushered me toward the secondary-screening room.

"Yes," I replied. "I don't want to lie to you. I no longer live in the United States."

Under U.S. law, permanent residents lose that status if they leave the country for more than one year. Yet many green-card holders do precisely that, returning to the United States periodically to "keep their options open." They often maintain U.S. addresses, sometimes with family or friends, but just as often with commercial providers, in order to sustain the fiction that they reside in the United States. Some companies even rent street addresses, as opposed to box numbers, and will automatically ship any mail received there onward to a designated foreign address.

Absentee green-card holders often use their driver's licences to cross the border, or new passports that are free of stamps that might alert an attentive immigration officer to their dubious status. If asked, they will deny having a connection with the United States.

Such ploys are becoming riskier as the computer systems of different U.S. government departments, and different national governments, are linked together to improve security. At particular risk are green-card holders who have failed to file U.S. tax returns, as all permanent residents are required to do.

As of Jan. 1, 2007, anyone entering the United States by air or sea will be required to have a passport or other as-yet-unspecified "secure" document. From Jan. 1, 2008, the same requirement will apply to those entering on land. The Canadian government has lobbied against this move because of concerns that it will deter millions of Americans -- less than one-quarter of whom currently have passports -- from visiting Canada. The cruise-ship and conference industries are particularly vulnerable, along with the 2010 Winter Olympics.

The new requirement will also make it more difficult for green-card holders living in Canada, and Canadians living illegally in the United States, to move freely between the two countries.

At last month's Cancun summit, George W. Bush indicated that he supported the passport legislation: "Congress passed the law and I intend to enforce the law." At record low levels in the polls, Mr. Bush is not about to veto a bill brought forward by members of his own party in preparation for the mid-term congressional elections this fall. Prime Minister Stephen Harper quickly conceded that Canada could do nothing to resist.

At the secondary screening, I was greeted by an immigration officer whose name tag and features suggested Vietnamese origins.

"Which form should I use?" he asked his supervisor. The supervisor, a stout man with a mid-western accent, gave a world-weary sigh. "Voluntaries get the short form."

It took 45 minutes to complete the short form. It was an entirely business-like procedure: No small talk, no smiles. At one point, I commented on the complexity of the process. He said, "Well, this is a big deal. It's like getting married."

No, I thought. It was more like getting divorced.

My wife and I had moved to North Carolina in 1999. The stock market was booming, most Americans felt prosperous and secure, and Bill Clinton -- despite Whitewater and Lewinsky -- was still capably in charge. It seemed obvious that one of two smart, experienced, open-minded internationalists, Al Gore or John McCain, would follow in January, 2001.

But then we were amused, perplexed and finally disgusted at the dirty tricks deployed in the 2000 election campaign, first to defeat Mr. McCain, and then to steal victory from Mr. Gore. And we felt nothing but horror as the Twin Towers collapsed, knowing not only that thousands of lives had been lost, but that Mr. Bush's neo-conservative advisers would seize their chance to plot a militaristic course.

My instinctive response was to put words to paper. Five days later, on Sept. 16, 2001, my article, "The hawks are hovering. Prepare for more bombs," appeared in London's Independent on Sunday. I continued to write, almost exclusively for British papers, chastising the Bush administration for its unnecessary violations of human rights and international law.

Needless to say, my opinions attracted considerable hostility, all the more so because I was expressing them from within a conservative law school at a conservative university in the very conservative South. I stood my ground, but it wasn't easy. And then it occurred to me: The United States wasn't my country; it wasn't a place for which I wanted to fight. My thoughts drifted northward, to the place where my values had been forged.

The immigration officer worked his way through a series of questions designed to confirm my identity and soundness of mind. The last question was the toughest: "Why do you wish to surrender your permanent resident card?"

How do you explain to an American -- especially one with a flag on his shoulder and a gun on his hip -- that you no longer wish to live in the United States?

I thought about the man across the counter, how he would have fled the postwar chaos and poverty of Vietnam, how he might have been plucked off a rickety boat by the U.S. Navy and may have gravitated toward the immigration service out of an innate sense of gratitude to his new homeland.

My principal motivation in surrendering my green card was not to avoid problems at the border. I was seeking to commit -- without hesitation or qualification -- to my own special place. As someone who was born in Canada, I never had to affirm my citizenship. I never had to demonstrate my deep love for this country. Unlike the millions of Canadians who were born outside Canada, I'd never made my choice.

The moment was upon me. My heart bursting with pride, I looked the immigration officer in the eye and said, as simply and non-judgmentally as possible: "I have chosen to live permanently in Canada."

"Permanently?" he asked.

"Yes," I said, "Of course."

Michael Byers holds the Canada Research Chair in Global Politics and International Law at the University of British Columbia.

Associated Press, Jan 30

Hundreds of illegal immigrants who were transferred from the San Pedro detention facility late last year to one in Texas are having their cases heard by video conference.

Immigration attorneys said the change of venue combined with video hearings hurts the detainees' chances of winning their immigration cases, including those seeking asylum.

"What is crucial in presenting these types of cases, where people are fighting to stay in the U.S., is to be in a place where your relatives and witnesses can testify," said Marc Van Der Hout, a San Francisco immigration attorney. "If you live in Los Angeles and are shipped to Texas, your chance of winning your case has decreased by 99 percent."

Others said at the very least videoconference hearings should have been sought with immigration judges in Los Angeles.

"To change the venue of these cases but then be giving individuals videoconference hearings doesn't make sense," said Judy Rabinovitz, a senior attorney with the ACLU's Immigrant's Rights Project in New York. "The federal government has a lot of explaining to do as to why they requested the change of venue."

Congress approved videoconference hearings in 1996 as a way to help overwhelmed immigration courts.

San Pedro was shut down unexpectedly for repairs in October. A majority of the more than 400 detainees were sent to the South Texas Correctional Facility.

Shortly after the closure, federal officials tried to move detainees' cases out of Los Angeles immigration courts and into other courts around the nation.

Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said venue changes were necessary to ensure timely hearings.

"ICE sought change of venue in the vast majority of the pending San Pedro cases because our attorneys believed that was the appropriate action," Kice said. "The aliens' attorneys can oppose those changes of venue and request a hearing using video teleconference technology. Ultimately, the final decision rests with the courts."

Neils Frenzen, who runs USC Law School's immigration clinic, said government attorneys are ignoring judge's rulings against the venue changes.

Frenzen said immigration officials lost their bid to move his client's case to South Texas, but then refused to bring the immigrant back to California.

"What ICE has done is file a second round of motions to change venue," Frenzen said. "To suggest the government filed the motions but it is the immigration judges who decides is ridiculous."

Unlike criminal defendants, immigrants are not entitled to an attorney. Nearly 65 percent of the 308 San Pedro detainees who had their court venues changed have no legal help, according to the Department of Justice.

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/usa/2008/01/fighting_for_a_piece_of_the_am.html

Fighting to share the American Dream

Immigration policy has become a hot-button issue in the US presidential election campaign

January 31, 2008 3:25 AM

Immigration is one of the most contentious and emotional issues in the United States today - an issue that cuts to the core of what it means to be an American, and of what kind of country America wants to become. In the 2008 presidential race, immigration policy will come to the fore as the political field narrows, and especially as the primary season gives way to the general election.

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have already been jockeying for the growing Latino vote, all the while trying not to alienate others on this hot-button issue. On the Republican side, John McCain's pragmatic and relatively humane position is under attack from Mitt Romney, who seeks to capitalize on the streak of Nativist, anti-immigrant feeling that has resurfaced in US politics in recent years. For millions of ordinary people in America's cities and small towns, its factories and fields, these policies are matters of life and death, and how the immigration debate is resolved will in large part control their destinies.

In the back offices of St Brigid's Roman Catholic church in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn, a dozen people sit quietly in a waiting room, peering from time to time through an open door into a small study. There, behind a desk, sits Monsignor James Kelly, his white hair shooting out on all sides. Across from him is a thin, blonde woman from Guatemala. She has two manila envelopes stuffed with papers in front of her. She is crying. This tiny room is one of the frontlines in the battle over immigration, and these people are its soldiers - and its casualties.

This part of Bushwick is a poor area, a long subway ride from Manhattan's towers of wealth and commerce. It is inhabited largely by Latinos, a good many of them from Ecuador, with a wide scattering from other lands. The church, which sits at the centre of the community, is crammed each Sunday with 1,200 or more people - adults, children, babies in carriages. At a time when many Catholic churches are seeing their parishioners dwindle, they fill the pews and clog every aisle, listening intently to Father Kelly saying mass in Spanish. The music is lively, with a trace of Pentecostal fervor to it, and there is a charismatic tone to the service. Every Sunday, this priest gives the mass twice in Spanish, once in English and once in Italian for the small number of elderly Italian Americans still living in the area. After mass, in the bitter cold outside, Father Kelly talks politics non-stop, pausing to bless an elderly woman, to reach inside a baby carriage and touch an infant's forehead. He talks rapidly in English, then in Spanish, switching seamlessly back and forth.

Father Kelly is not your usual parish priest. He looks out for his parishioners' souls, but also for their rights: In order to serve his flock, Kelly became a lawyer, and often argues cases before the courts. Every weekday morning, the church offices become a makeshift legal clinic, and fill with people embroiled in immigration matters. Kelly, who came to the US from Ireland many years ago, personally listens to each one, scurries across the room to a computer to look up details, thumbs through a law book for more information. All of it is free.

The priest wrestles with what to say to the blonde woman. Her husband is legal, but she hasn't been here long and is illegal. There is a sense of quiet desperation about her. The priest puts his hands over his face. He doesn't want to hurt her, bu