Undocumented immigrants cannot be automatically jailed for crimes, NY court rules
By Douglass Dowty | ddowty@syracuse.com
on July 31, 2015 at 12:56 PM
Brooklyn, NY -- Immigrants without proper documentation cannot be automatically jailed once convicted of crimes, a state appeals court has ruled.
That doesn't mean that judges cannot factor the immigrant's status into a punishment; only that it cannot be used alone to justify incarceration.
The case stems from a Peruvian immigrant who was convicted of felony drunken driving in 2013. Luis Cesar had entered the country with a visa in 2007 to attend the wedding of his girlfriend's daughter, but then remained after his visa expired in 2013,the New York Law Journal reported.
A judge sentenced Cesar to 8 months in prison, despite his lawyer's protests, because of his undocumented status. That judge reasoned that he couldn't put Cesar on probation because he would violate the first rule of probation, that is following all the laws.
But the appeals court ruled that the judge's policy of automatically sentencing undocumented immigrants to jail violated Cesar's right to due process and equal protection.
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that undocumented immigrants are entitled to due process and equal protection under most circumstances. The nation's highest court has also ruled that it is not a crime for "removable" immigrants to be in the United States.
It is up to the federal government, not a state judge, to determine which immigrants are targeted for deportation. That is a separate proceeding from a criminal case.
http://www.syracuse.com/crime/index....urt_rules.html
