Posted on 11/16/2002 11:50:11 PM PST by TexKat
APPROXIMATELY 12,000 Jamaicans living in America have been targeted for deportation by the US Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS), the Sunday Observer has learnt.
Of that number, more than 700 are now in custody and are expected to be sent home soon.
"The INS are holding in excess of 700 Jamaicans in custody who are ready to be deported anytime now," security attaché at the Jamaican Embassy in Washington, Assistant Commissioner of Police Errol Strong, told the Sunday Observer in a telephone interview last week.
Strong, however, could not say exactly when the deportations would be effected, as the Jamaican mission, he said, was processing the detained persons to verify that they were indeed Jamaicans.
"You see, the embassy has to interview everyone of them to make sure they are Jamaica nationals, because some of them are not able to establish that they are Jamaicans," Strong said.
According to Strong, between 10,000 and 12,000 Jamaicans have been identified by the INS for deportation. "Some of them are already in jail, some are illegal aliens, others have been convicted and are out there on the streets and can be picked up at any time," he said.
Data obtained from the Jamaican Embassy in Washington showed that United States authorities have deported 15,797 Jamaicans over the last 10 years. But, according to the Jamaican police, only 20 per cent of them have criminal records here.
Between January and October this year, 1,020 Jamaicans were deported from the US. Strong said a vast majority of them would have either committed "A" felonies of various sorts, including drug and firearm offences, murder, shooting, larceny, burglary, rape and assault. He said 60 per cent of the deportees have been convicted for either ganja or crack cocaine.
Local authorities have long argued that deportees have been playing a major role in the large number of crimes committed in Jamaica.
Jamaican officials have also complained to the United States government that significant numbers of the persons deported were born in the US to Jamaican parents, or left the island when they were very young, therefore it was unfair that they should be sent here after they are convicted of criminal behaviour as they, most likely had no family support base in the island.
Last year, in response to Jamaica's spiralling crime rate, Parliament passed legislation permitting the monitoring of deportees.
Earlier this month, the US Embassy in Kingston asked the State Department to fund a joint study by Washington and Kingston on the controversial issue.
US ambassador to Jamaica, Sue Cobb, said studies done over a year ago showed that the majority of Jamaicans who are deported from America entered that country at age 21 and remain there for eight to 10 years before they break US laws and are sent home.
Last week, Strong said that the more than 700 Jamaicans now being processed for deportation had already served sentences for various offences.
"These persons are ready to be deported, as the majority of them have served that portion of their sentences which would have satisfied the orders of the courts and the legal authorities," he said, adding "we hope to be clearing for deportation approximately 120 to 130 of them each month."
Which nationality is next?
Thats the best way to make sure he gets the message.......put it in Freepland.
About damn time.
12,000 down; 12 million to go.
exactly! And then those kids are CITIZENS, and have the right to bring their families here to the US.
We need new laws and regulations to specifically:
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