Monday Must Reads – The Immigration Version

9TH CIRCUIT SAYS THAT A MAN NOT TOLD HE’D BE DEPORTED MAY WITHDRAW HIS PLEA

It’s not at all an uncommon story: A man or woman who has lived in the U.S. as a legal resident since childhood, but who is not a citizen, is accused of a crime and is persuaded to plead guilty and accept a deal rather than go to trial. No one mentions any kind of immigration consequences.

He (or she) does the prison time and, as his release date approaches, prepares to restart his life. Instead he is deported to a country where he has never lived as an adult, and that he barely remembers. He will never be allowed to return to the U.S. for the rest of his life.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports on such a story, but one that has a chance at a different ending courtesy of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

(In 2005, I reported on a related story for the LA Times, but it had a much less happy ending. I’m still in contact with the subject of the story. He’s living in Mexico, doing his best to support his four kids, all of them American citizens, who have come to live with their dad because they missed him so terribly. In the US he was making a good living as an expert carpenter, volunteering as a little league coach, living a decent life. Now he works for subsistence wages, while his eldest boy puts off school so he can stay home and take care of the kids. (He is separated from the children’s mother.)

Relying on a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling, a federal appeals court said Friday that a Watsonville man who has lived legally in the United States for more than 30 years can withdraw his guilty plea to gun possession because his lawyer failed to tell him he would be deported after finishing his sentence. [You can find the decision here.]

Jose Bonilla Jr. has already served most of the two-year prison term he was given in 2009 for two felony charges in connection with a sawed-off shotgun that police found in his car after a gang fight. Federal law requires that any noncitizen convicted of those charges be deported.

Bonilla came to the United States with his family in 1976 when he was 3 years old. The court said he has been a legal resident for more than 30 years. In court papers, his current lawyer said Bonilla was a gang member in his youth but had settled down and was active in his church and community.

Before Bonilla’s guilty plea, his wife asked his trial lawyer whether the charges would result in deportation. But the court said she got no answer until after the plea, when the lawyer told her Bonilla would be deported.

Bonilla then asked to withdraw his plea, saying he would have negotiated for lesser charges or gone to trial if he had known he would be removed from the country and separated from his wife and two children, all U.S. citizens. The trial judge refused, saying Bonilla had obviously known he might be deported….

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IN OKLAHOMA, REPUBLICAN LAWMAKERS WANT IMMIGRATION CRACK DOWN, WHILE REPUBLICAN BUSINESS COMMUNITY—NOT SO MUCH

The AP has the story:

A quiet campaign by Oklahoma’s business community to head off tough new immigration legislation is causing an angry rift among Republicans in the Legislature, some of whom charge voters’ desire for more action to curb illegal workers is being sabotaged.

In political campaigns across Oklahoma last year, many Republican candidates vowed to target illegal immigrants, and came into office with plans to give the state the toughest anti-immigration policies in the nation.

But the push for a crackdown is running headlong into another Republican priority — creating a pro-business climate that would make Oklahoma more attractive to business and industry.

A sweeping immigration measure is pending in the Senate, but it has been stripped of most provisions that penalize businesses for hiring illegal workers — a key part of earlier proposals. A separate bill passed in the House last week includes few restrictions on businesses.

At least in this case, the schizophrenic nature of immigration policy (and the grandstanding around it) is out in the open.

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NEW JERSEY SCHOOL VALEDICTORIAN WANTS TO WORK FOR NASA BUT IS GETTING DEPORTED INSTEAD

I hate these stories. And, yes, this kid is one more reason why we need to pass the DREAM act.

The Star-Ledger has the details.

Vidal Tapia is by all accounts International High School’s brightest prospect. A teacher-described “pillar of strength” at the Paterson school, he carries a 4.0 GPA, a National Honor Society membership and a slew of community service hours. He was tapped as his class’s valedictorian to give the commencement address in June. Eventually, he wants to work for NASA.

But his plans might fall short of even graduation, not because of any academic problems, but rather an immigration snare. By next week, the 19-year-old senior could be sent back to his native Mexico, barred from returning to the United States for a decade.

Tapia immigrated here illegally about five years ago. Since then, his petition for U.S. residency has been accepted and an interview for a green card was scheduled for Wednesday at the consulate in Ciudad Juarez. But because he unlawfully crossed the border and now is an adult, he is likely to face a 10-year ban from setting foot on U.S. soil, regardless of whether he qualifies for residency status. That would mean no commencement speech in June, no diploma in the near future and no American job possibilities until he’s in his 30s…..