Monday, July 14, 2014

Undocumented Immigrant Sentenced For Illegal Re-entry

Mexican national sentenced for illegally reentering US after deportation




HARTFORD, Conn. July 14, 2014 — A Mexican national was sentenced Monday to 30 months in federal prison for illegally reentering the United States after being deported. Marcos Martinez Gutierrez, age 43, was identified through the ICE Secure Communities Program after his arrest by Norwalk, Connecticut police. The sentence is the result of an investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO).

Gutierrez allegedly was removed three times. His most recent deportation was in June of 2011, according to an ICE press release. Gutierrez violated U.S. law in several aspects. He has four convictions for DUI, three convictions for possession of narcotics, two convictions for assault against his girlfriend, one conviction for patronizing a prostitute and one conviction for criminal impersonation. He also has two convictions for illegal entry into the U.S. He appears to have an addiction problem and might respond to therapy if he got the chance. It does not appear as if that chance will be forthcoming.

Gutierrez has been in custody since March 3, 2013. In July 2013, he was sentenced in Connecticut state court to three years of incarceration for possession of narcotics and criminal impersonation.

On April 14, 2014, Martinez-Gutierrez pleaded guilty in federal court to one count of illegal reentry of a removed alien. U.S. District Judge Alvin W. Thompson sentenced Martinez-Gutierrez to 30 months in federal prison. The judge could have ordered Martinez-Gutierrez to serve consecutive sentences for his state and federal guilty pleas, but instead ordered the undocumented immigrant to serve one sentence, and then the second for a total time in prison of 6 years.

Some advocates for national security encourage immigration reform that would give people like Martinez-Gutierrez one final chance and allow them to remain in the U.S. with family, friends and relatives. This group argues it is better to identify all undocumented people in the U.S., to keep families together (family values), and to not interrupt business activity, while helping to balance the budget through fines.

 A more popular version of immigration reform denies the benefit of identification of all persons and would favor the deportation of people found guilty of most crimes, like Martinez-Gutierrez. Still others, including Speaker of the House (U.S. House of Representatives) John Boehner, wish to forgo the opportunity to identify at least 40% of the people in the country by blocking immigration reform all together.

Presumably, ICE says they are focusing on deporting violent criminals. However, what ICE says they plan to do and what they are actually doing often varies. However, if ICE only deports violent criminals, they destabilize Mexico by dumping these persons on the border, where they are forced to join gangs. Their presence has made the border a very dangerous place. 

 Most people are convinced, if a person must be incarcerated, that person would be better guarded in the U.S. Most criminal aliens adopted their criminal ways in the U.S. hence are a U.S. problem. That problem should not be deported to another country where the person is placed in high risk situations for re-offending, and causing destabilization in their native country, and eventually, in the U.S.  American lives come into play when soldiers are sent to guard the border, with the border patrol and for those Americans who are sent to countries made less stable though the U.S. deportation policy.

The Secure Communities program has caused friction between ICE and local law enforcement. ICE often makes promises it later refuses to keep in order to convince governors to enter into the secure communities program.  Local governments pay for the time inmates are held for ICE pick-up, a cost that belongs to the federal government.  ICE initially agrees to only use the program for serious criminal offenders, but then uses the program to deport people who are not guilty of any crime, or only minor crimes.

Every country has a right to protect itself. Deportation policy becomes sticky in this regard. Agencies charged with protecting national security seek to identify and remove immigrants who break the law. However, that removal leaves a family without a provider, a child without a parent, and the inevitable cycle of school yard to prison yard a sure path for repetition. It is not that children of immigrants are more likely to be offenders.  Rather, 70% of all males incarcerated come from single parent families.  

Even those charged with enforcing immigration law sometimes get caught in dead end jobs in the deportation industry, like some who become private guards in for-profit prisons, including Aurora, Colorado's GEO Group. At the end of the rainbow, there are no winners, including the American people.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Krishna R. Patel and Carolyn A. Ikari.

Monday, June 30, 2014

Denver Civil Rights Groups Furious Over House Immigration Disaster

No More Words and Empty Promises


CIRC Calls for Immediate End to Deportations and Maximum Relief and Protection for Immigrant Families

Senator Micheal Bennet


Washington, D.C. / Denver, CO: Today, President Obama announced that the House Republican leadership informed him directly that they will not pursue a vote on comprehensive immigration reform legislation in 2014. The President stated that he has asked his administration to deliver proposals for executive actions on immigration by the end of summer.

The President said:

"If Congress will not do their job, at least we can do ours. I expect the recommendations before the end of the summer, and I intend to adopt those recommendations without further delay."

The following is a statement by Caroline Casteel, Board President of the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition (CIRC):

After years of struggle to defend against unjust deportations and to keep our families together, we welcome the President's public commitment to pursue executive and administrative immigration reforms. However, the time for more announcements and declarations has long past. Our families and communities are deeply disillusioned and angry by the many promises broken by Congress and the Obama Administration.


Immigration reform has failed again, and unjust deportations and family separations have reached deplorable record numbers.


Meanwhile, Colorado Senator Michael Bennet called on the President to "use His Legal Authority to Ease the Burden on Businesses, Workers, Families".

We call on the President to follow today's announcement with swift, bold, and aggressive executive action to provide the most immediate and beneficial relief and protections possible. For our communities, this is the test through which we will remember and judge President Obama and his administration. We expect him to act on the right side of history and move forward to take the moral and urgent step of ending terrible family separations.

"The Colorado immigrant rights movement will not stop working and fighting until we win permanent relief and protections, both through the strongest immediate executive actions possible, and through more comprehensive legislation in the future" a CIRC spokesperson said.

"We pledge to continue to work to mobilize our communities to the voting polls this November to hold Congress accountable for their failure to pass immigration reform and to demonstrate the pro-immigrant values that define Colorado's electorat
e," CIRC continued.

Frankly, this appears to be an example of polarization which cost Republicans heavily in the last election.  While many pundits blamed the Republican loss on the failure of immigration reform, voters were really expressing their rage at the refusal of both parties, but especially the Republican party, to come to the table with rational compromises.  Meanwhile, tax payers and citizens continue to pay a huge price for the vitriol expressed through a representative system that appears to be failing to represent the greatest minority, a hallowed goal of democracy.

Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Ft. Hood Shooting Not First, Authorities Hope It Is The Last

Heroic Efforts By Base Law Enforcement Stopped Further Loss






The shooter has been named as Ivan Lopez.  An investigation has been launched.  The shooter self reported asking for help with likely depression and PTSD or a traumatic brain injury.  He has served as active duty in a war zone.  The evaluation was "in process".  

Once news of the shooting reached base police, a female base police officer found and confronted the shooter.  At that time, the shooter took his own life.  Up to 16 victims were injured, according to reports.

Friday, March 21, 2014

Colorado Western Slope Leaders Support Immigration Reform




Grand Junction, CO – A few years ago, an article ran in the Denver Post about prison inmates who loved to work in the fields with their bare hands at centavos each hour.  The article, clearly a farce on our broken immigration system, suggested the arrangement was a solution to getting rotting crops out of the ground.  Legal migrant workers, as well as undocumented workers, were avoiding Colorado after reports of aggressive enforcement.  Farm owners suffered huge losses because they could not find enough labor to salvage their crops.  Perhaps forced labor worked in Russia after the second world war.  Using prison labor to prop up a workforce is not a hallmark of a democratic society because it encourages the creation of more criminal laws in order to incarcerate more people for the sole purposes of building a workforce.

CLUB 20, a business advocacy group for Colorado’s 22 Western Counties where the shortage of this labor was prominent, passed a resolution supporting the “bipartisan nature” and “broad coalition” of the Senate’s immigration overhaul bill.  The bill was written by the bipartisan “Gang of 8” Senators that included Colorado U. S. Senator Michael Bennet.

The CLUB 20 resolution, which was passed by unanimous consent at today’s fall meeting of the CLUB 20 Board, encouraged the Colorado Congressional delegation to support the principles of the bill.

That immigration bill, which passed the Senate in June, makes important fixes to an outdated visa system, provides significantly more tools and resources to secure the border, establishes a sensible system for the future flow of immigration, and creates a tough but fair path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.  The immigration bill passed the Senate in June with a bipartisan 68-32 vote.  The House of Representatives at first proposed a conservative form of immigration reform that leaves over 50% of immigrants out reform.  However, even the conservative proposals have not been allowed to move forward in the House.

“There’s no place more affected by our broken immigration system than the West Slope,” Bennet said. “From peach growers to tourism companies to local businesses, our Western Slope communities are hurt by our country’s immigration policies. The rest of our state is also suffering – ranchers on the Eastern Plains, high-tech companies along the Front Range, and ski resorts in our mountain towns. Colorado needs an immigration system that works for us, not against us, and CLUB 20, by virtue of its vote today, recognizes this salient fact.”

“CLUB 20 represents the interests of Colorado’s western counties. Those counties are hurt by our country’s broken immigration system,” Steve Reynolds, Chair of Club 20, said. “Something needs to be done.  Some fix needs to be made, and while the Senate’s immigration bill might not be perfect, it’s a good compromise that will help Western Colorado.  The alternative – doing nothing and maintaining the status quo – is not acceptable.”

Senator Michael Bennet has been at the forefront of immigration reform.  In personal conversations and sometime publicly, he speaks about his own family history in immigrating to the U.S.  Immigrants have made America what it is, including Alexander Graham Bell, and in more recent times, Google through it's co-founder, Sergey Brin.  Reform would pass in the U.S. House with strong bi-partisan support if it could get to the floor for a vote.  A few conservative Republicans are holding up the reform bill.


Friday, March 7, 2014

Border Patrol Arrests Resident Alien For Smuggling Undocumented Immigrant

U.S. Patrol Alleged Human Smuggling Attempt


(Thursday, March 06, 2014)

Brownsville, Texas - U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers at the Brownsville and Matamoros International Bridge detained a resident alien female for alleged violations of immigration law. The resident alien, a citizen of Mexico, allegedly attempted to smuggle a 42-year-old man into the United States without valid entry documents.


ICE Photo


“This alleged smuggling attempt of a man from Mexico into the country was stopped by our CBP officers working on enforcing immigration laws at our country’s borders. This man will not be allowed to enter the country and the alleged smuggler will face federal charges thanks to the work on the front line by our CBP officers,” said Michael Freeman, CBP Port Director, Brownsville.

On March 4, a vehicle with two women and their children pulled up to the port and presented documents for themselves and their children.  Suspicious for reasons unstated, the inspection officer signaled the driver to pull into the area designated for secondary inspections.  Shortly, an undocumented male, aged 42, was found hiding in the vehicle.

CBP officers took the driver and the undocumented man into custody for alleged violations of immigration law. The 42-year-old man was processed as an undocumented alien and both will face federal charges. The adult female passenger and her children were released. The driver’s minor children were turned over to a family member.

Incidents of this nature transpire at the border frequently.  CBP remains quiet about why they chose to publicize this particular event.  Resident aliens who participate in illegal activity are subject to loss of their residency along with other penalties if found guilty.

Information for this story was obtained from CBP.

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Free Tax Help From IRS In Spanish and English

Best Ways to Get Free Tax Help from the IRS



Photo credit tom copeland Blog




Many of us need information when preparing our federal tax returns. We have questions about dependents, which forms to use and how to claim a credit.

Here are the best ways to get free help from the IRS:

• Visit the IRS on the Web.  The IRS.gov website is your one-stop tax shop. Start at ‘1040 Central.’ Before you go anywhere else, look here for tips and information that will help you file your federal tax return. This page has links to information about filing options, the latest news and frequently asked questions.

You will also find links to a number of online tools like the Interactive Tax Assistant and the IRS Tax Map for answers to your tax questions. Use’Where’s My Refund?’ to check on your refund or use the EITC Assistantto see if you’re eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit. You can also get all the forms and publications you need 24x7.

• Use IRS Free File to do your taxes.  Everyone can use IRS Free Fileto prepare and electronically file their federal tax return for free. IRS Free File is available exclusively on IRS.gov. The fastest way to get your refund is to combine e-file with direct deposit.

If you made $58,000 or less, you can use Free File tax software to e-file your tax return. The software is easy to use and will guide you through the steps of filing your taxes. If your income is more than $58,000 and you’re comfortable doing your own taxes, you can use Free File Fillable Forms. This program is the electronic version of IRS paper forms.

• Get tax help in your community.  The Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program helps people who make $52,000 or less prepare and file their tax returns for free. The Tax Counseling for the Elderly program offers help mainly to people 60 or older. AARP is part of the TCE program and helps taxpayers with low-to-moderate incomes.

VITA sites are located in neighborhoods all over the USA. Visit IRS.gov and enter ‘VITA’ in the search box. Then click ‘Free Tax Return Preparation for You’ to locate a VITA or TCE site near you.

If you don't have Internet access you can call 800-TAX-FORM (800-829-3676) to order IRS forms and publications. You can check the status of your refund by calling 800-829-4477. Call the same number to hear taped messages on more than 150 tax topics. You can find the closest VITA site by calling the IRS at 800-906-9887.

IRS YouTube Videos:
IRS Podcasts:
Credit, Internal Revenue Service Media