Editorial
FOREIGNERS IN GANGS SHOULD BE DEPORTED
Hal Netkin\ Local View

05/03/2002
Los Angeles Daily News
VALLEY
N15

IN 1997, according to a confidential state Department of Justice report, 60 percent of the members of the notorious 18th Street Gang in Los Angeles were illegal immigrants, estimated to be as many as 20,000.

Mayor James K. Hahn has rightfully taken steps to reduce gang crime, but he has left out a powerful ingredient: deportation of those gang members who are here illegally.

Many point to a federal court order that invalidated Proposition 187 on the grounds that local police could not lawfully enforce immigration law. But on Oct. 4, 1999, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal of a landmark decision by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in USA v. Vasquez-Alvarez, confirming that state and local law enforcement officials are free to arrest criminals solely on the basis of their illegally being in the United States.

This ruling finally put to rest any question that local governments have about their authority to join the federal government in the fight against illegal alien criminals.

Many believe that the Los Angeles Police Department's Special Order 40, which originated 19 years ago from former Police Chief Daryl F. Gates and the Los Angeles City Council, prevents police from inquiring about the immigration status of gang members.

But Special Order 40 was meant only to limit the police from randomly questioning people as to their immigration status. It does not prohibit police officers from questioning the immigration status of suspected gang members.

This was made clear in a recent Special Order 40 report by the Rampart Independent Review Panel to the Board of Los Angeles Police Commissioners.

The LAPD rightfully argues that without Special Order 40, innocent undocumented immigrant witnesses and victims would lose the trust of the LAPD and would not report crimes for fear of being deported.

But determining the immigration status of known gang members has nothing to do with protecting innocent witnesses and victims.

Moreover, as a former Van Nuys block captain, I can tell you that most undocumented immigrants - the overwhelming majority - do not step forward as witnesses, not because they fear the police but because they fear retaliation by gang members. These immigrants favor the deportation of gang members.

If Mayor James Hahn and City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo believe that injunctions that limit where gang members can congregate does not violate their constitutional rights, certainly they should have no problem with reporting known illegal alien gang members to the Immigration and Naturalization Service for deportation.

The implementation of deporting illegal alien gang members will do more for controlling gang crime than all of Mayor Hahn's anti- crime steps put together.