Immigration Action Day in Texas

Send a message to Congress that immigrants make important contributions to American life that deserve lawmakers' respect. A rally for immigrant rights takes place today at 4 p.m. at the Texas state capitol building on the south steps in Austin. See a flyer promoting the event. Here's a list of other, related events scheduled around the state:

• AMARILLO – 9 am Civic Center , with walk to City Hall
• AUSTIN – UT – 11 am – 2 pm West Mall , UT campus
• AUSTIN – State Capitol – 4-6 pm
• CORPUS CHRISTI – 6 pm Memorial Coliseum
• EL PASO - 10:00am (Sunland Park City Hall), 12:30 pm (Chamizal), 4:00 pm (Plaza de los Lagartos)
• HOUSTON – 1:30 pm Guadalupe Plaza , 3 pm Allen’s Landing
• HOUSTON – 7-8 pm, University of St. Thomas , Student Life Mall
• SAN ANTONIO – 2 pm – Student Walk Out – Incarnate Word, Dubius Lawn
• SAN ANTONIO - 5 pm from Milam Park to the Federal Building
• TYLER – 8-11 am at the Super 1 on 271

Snitches top list of unreliable sources causing wrongful convictions

Graphic: The Innocence Project

Snitch testimony is the number one type of unreliable evidence in wrongful conviction cases, according to Talk Left's reporting on a conference on wrongful convictions this weekend in Los Angeles. (Click on the graphic to enlarge.)

Be reasonable, please

Doc Berman hits the nail on the head with this question about the legitimacy of federal sentencing guidelines:

Is a system that declares distribution of 5 ounces of crack more serious than conspiracy to commit murder and criminal sexual abuse really the sort of system that should be afforded a presumption of reasonableness?

No friggin kidding!

Even with cold pills behind the counter: "We still have the addicts"

More news that pseudoephedrine restrictions don't reduce meth addiction. The Houston Chronicle this week ("New law puts dent in homemade meth," April 3) reported that Texas' new law restricting sale of pseuodephedrine curtailed the number of home labs, but Mexican and California suppliers have already filled the market gap and meth addiction continues unabated:

The new law allows people to buy two boxes of pills at a time, but they must show identification and sign for the purchase.

"We go around to the stores and pick up the lists. It's obvious who is 'smurfing' the pills," Whitehead said, using the slang term for making numerous, small purchases and accumulating enough pills to make a batch of the drug. "Quite a few of the ones we spot already have pending charges."

Statewide, lab seizures are down by an even larger margin: from 345 in 2003 to a current average of 10 a month, or 120 a year, according to Texas Department of Public Safety and U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency figures.

The demand for the drug has not slacked, however, and state and federal authorities say they are seeing an increase in seizures of methamphetamine imported from Mexico, including "ice" a form of the drug that, unlike homemade speed, is pure enough to be smoked.

Thirty five states have such laws, and Congress recently passed their own version. If Texas' experience is any measure, though, don't think for a moment putting cold medicine behind the counter solves anything. Even politicians who touted the statutes don't think they've curbed meth addiciton:

State Rep. Leo Berman, R-Tyler, who sponsored Texas' pseudoephedrine bill, conceded it has not solved the meth problem.

"Stopping the labs is a plus for the communities where they're located," said Berman. He said young children are not exposed to the dangers of their parents cooking the drug in their homes. And the labs leave by-products that cost thousands of dollars to clean up, he said.

"We've gotten rid of some of the meth," Berman said, agreeing that imported meth is filling the void. "We still have the addicts."

Exactly. Supply side solutions alone can't stop people from abusing meth. In other jurisdictions, increases in burglaries have been reported as addicts who used to cook their own must pay cash for more expensive Mexican products. Maybe next session Rep. Berman and his colleagues will support more funding for drug courts, stronger probation, and solutions that work instead of creating new, more punitive measures.

From the blogs

• Radio Days. Doc Berman points to two NPR stories from Justice Talking related to juvenile sentences and probation/parole.

• Treatment cheaper than incarceration. CrimProf blog brings news of a new study that found California saves $2.50 to $4.00 in incarceration costs for every dollar spent on drug treatment.

• School drug testing. Capitol Annex says the Jefferson school district may implement drug testing, banning students from participating in school activities for 30 days if they test positive. In South Texas, the United Independent School District is distributing drug testing kits to parents for home use.

• Private prison blues. South Texas Chisme says LULAC is criticizing a private prison company building a federal detention facility near Driscoll, declaring the company has a history of escapes and prisoner abuse.

Snitch case from hell targets South Asians in GA

Here's an odd twist on the use of snitches in the drug war. The spread of laws limiting sale of meth "precursors" have led to law enforcement targeting South Asian convenience store owners in rural Georgia, the New York Times reported today. Forty four of 49 defendants in the case are South Asian, while white store owners were mosty ignored. Reported the Times:

Documents filed by the A.C.L.U. yesterday include a sworn statement from an informant in the sting, saying that federal investigators sent informants only to Indian-owned stores, "because the Indians' English wasn't good." The informant said investigators ignored the informant's questions about why so many South-Asian-owned stores were visited in the sting.

Other filings said prosecutors had several tips that more than a dozen white-owned stores were selling the same ingredients, but failed to follow up on them.

The case reminds me of an incident Catonya mentioned in Wichita Falls where an Iranian convenience store owner received a life sentence for selling meth precursors.

UPDATE: Turns out there's a campaign website for "Operation Meth Merchant," with its own blog, no less. Thanks to Bob for pointing to the link in the comments.

NUTHER UPDATE: Pete at Drug War Rant relays an anecdote about precursor laws run amok.

Snitch whose crimes were tolerated by feds to be extradited to Mexico

Gathering information from informants is a dicey game - police are dealing with criminals who almost always have their own agenda. The case of Guillermo Eduardo Ramirez Peyro provides perhaps the best example since Whitey Bulger of how law enforcement's use of confidential informants can tolerate or encourage major crimes, sometimes worse than the ones they're helping investigate.

US authorities intend to extradite Peyro for 12 murders committed in Ciudad Juarez while he was working as an agent of US Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE), but according to an attorney for family members of Peyro's alleged murder victims, "The U.S. government wants him to stay hidden, so by extraditing him, he in effect disappears in Mexico and the U.S. government wipes its hands clean." Here's more background on the case from the Dallas Morning News last month ("US expected to extradite drug defendant from Mexico," Mar. 3):

Mexican authorities have a standing warrant for Ramirez Peyro in connection with the Jan. 2002 discovery of 12 bodies in the back yard of a suburban Ciudad Juarez home.

According to documents and transcripts, Ramirez Peyro had the keys to the house where the victims were executed. He assigned corrupt policemen their roles in several killings, going so far as to recommend how best to eliminate the victims, whether by shooting or by suffocation.

He called in gravediggers to bury bodies, paid off the killers and notified his contact that the job was done. He described the killings as carne asadas, or barbecues.

In at least one of case, U.S. officials said, agency supervisors had been notified ahead of time and listened in on an open cell-phone line as the killing took place, an allegation that ICE authorities have privately denied. ICE officials also say they had limited knowledge of Ramirez Peyro's alleged criminal activities.

So far, ICE's internal investigation has led to the removal or transfer of several officials. Top supervisors Giovanni Gaudioso and Patricia Kramer were transferred to Washington from El Paso. Kramer resigned under pressure last October, U.S. officials said.

Two agents were suspended without pay for about a month. Another remains on an extended leave of absence and at least four directors have come and gone over the past two years.

Even so, said Sandalio Gonzalez, the former special agent in charge of the El Paso field division of the Drug Enforcement Administration - who blew the whistle on ICE - Congress hasn't shown any interest in investigating the agency.

Gonzalez said he has met twice with Senate committee investigators with no results. ...

"The real question is who polices the executive branch of government," said Gonzalez. "It's Congress' job, and they have done nothing."

Thanks to Rebeccah Bernhardt for pointing this out to me.

Traveling-day links

Today's a travel day for me and blogging may be light for a few days. So chew on these items for now and maybe I'll find some blogging time this week in between meetings while I'm in California.

• Missing host. A conference of drug dog trainers in Nacogdoches was hampered by the dissolution of their host, the Deep East Texas Narcotics Task Force. "It's hard to get dope from a task force that ain't here," said a conference organizer.

• An overlooked solution to jail overcrowding. The Nueces County jail has accidentally released six different inmates since the new year.

• Common sense prevails. The Seventh Texas Court of Appeals said a pregnant mother ingesting drugs did not constitute delivery to the fetus under the statutes.

• Notes from underground. Might municipal restrictions on sex offender residency endanger children more than help them by driving sex offenders underground?

• Eighteen years is a long damn time. Read the New York Times profile of Arthur Mumphrey, an innocent Texan who spent 18 years in a Texas prison for a rape DNA tests confirm he did not commit. Mumphrey's brother actually committed the crime; he lied at his brother's trial, recanting a previous confession. A co-defendant also wrongly testified against Mumphrey in exchange for a reduced sentence.

• Entrepeneurial kiddie jail fails in Kerr County. The juvie facility now swimming in red ink was purchased through a non-profit run by the county, a model officials want to mimic down the road in San Angelo.

• Deep penetration. You know protests against the federal immigration bill have penetrated middle America when you see them in Odessa and Lufkin.

• Snitches on parade. Our friend and past Grits guest blogger Alan Bean covers a trial in Lafayette Louisiana based on apparently unreliable snitch testimony.

UPDATE: Reported murder could have been suicide

My neighbors report that "Rocket," the recently departed chicken who roamed into my yard and was devoured by one or more of my dogs, had been depressed recently, roaming around aimlessly, eating less and not laying eggs for many days.

This might not have been the murder I'd earlier alleged folks - the neighbors agree it's possible this was a suicide. Young Domino could be innocent, or at least only tangentially culpable. Call him an unwitting accomplice.

Austin City Council bactracks, a little, on ballot language

I told you the Austin City Council's ballot language for the Open Government Online charter amendment was misleading and inaccurate. A judge agreed. Now they've rewritten it. The ballot language is better, but still a piece of junk. In any event, now it's up to the voters.

For more see the Open Government Austin blog and CleanAustin.org.

What's the matter with 44% of Americans?

Citing this Rasmussen poll, DallasBlog reports:

• 65% of Americans think it's more important to restrict illegal immigration at the border than it is to expand legal opportunities for immigrants to have jobs.
• 44% say illegal immigrants currently working in the US should be forced to leave, while 39% believe that illegal immigrants already in the US that have jobs should have a way to stay."

That's a huge number, 44%, who harbor fantasies about mass deportations. (The Pew Center says it's 53%.) I can't even think of an historic parallel for what such an event would look like: Some grim tale out of Stalinist Russia, perhaps, or a twisted, writ large version of Indonesian transmigration.

Forty-four friggin percent! (Why am I shocked? 29% still think Saddam Hussein was involved with 9/11.) As I've said many times, I just don't get the harm and see many benefits from legalizing immigration levels high enough to meet US labor demand, indeed it's probably necessary for the future of the economy.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, those 44% are talking about forcibly deporting one out of every 20 American workers! Forget for a moment the human rights implications (though they'd certainly be unforgettable if that unhappy day ever arrived), a lot of people don't get the role of immigrant labor in redneck economics and how damaging it would be in the Southwest.

The guys at the day labor site aren't taking jobs from Americans. They're creating small businesses for the rednecks in pickup trucks hiring them each day. Housing, groceries, lots of the basics would get expensive really quick if you took away that labor pool. Sales taxes paid by immigrants support many public services they cannot legally access. When they pay rent, their landlord uses a portion to pay property taxes that support schools and public infrastructure.

Want higher taxes, more expensive motel rooms, bigger grocery bills, skyrocketing housing prices and an endless black hole of spending on a militarized border? Fine - pander to that 44%. Throw them a bone. But to do so will harm the economy more than it helps our security.

The whole, angry melange reminds me of Thomas Frank's analysis in What's the Matter with Kansas? of working class religious right activists who supported politicians based on social issues whose economic policies left them unemployed. Must 44% of Americans pay $20 for a bunch of grapes, $100 for a cheap motel, and $250,000 for a 1200-sq. foot home before coming to their senses? Will they even then, or would there be someone else to blame?

Saturday links roundup

I'm out for the day, but here's a brief roundup of Texas-related criminal justice items from the blogosphere and beyond:

The Chief Speaks. DallasBlog's Trey Garrison interviews Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle.

Drug Courts and Recidivism. The Corpus Christi Caller Times had a good article about their local drug court, but the writer dramatically overstated recidivism rates. The paper said the local drug court had "a recidivism rate of about 3 percent, which is shockingly below the 60 percent of released convicts nationwide who are arrested again." Three percent is pretty darn good, but I don't know where those national figures came from. According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Texas' three-year recidivism rate (those who re-enter prison within three years of their release) is just 28.2% (see TDCJ outcome measures, pdf, p. 137).

Drug Free Zones Redux. Concurring Opinions discusses the Justice Policy Institute report I mentioned on drug free zones.

Slippery Slopes. South Texas Chisme was surprised to learn sexual assault is tolerated in prison, not against inmates - by prison officials against co-workers.

Walkout! South TX Chisme also had a roundup on student walkouts protesting the federal immigration bill. Vince points out kids are even walking out in my hometown of Tyler, and I see in Lufkin too, and El Paso. Kuff thinks the kids should change tactics. Meanwhile, Nate wants a guest worker program, and Rep. Pena thinks the GOP is risking Latino votes.

Consequences of Corruption. Libby points out why a border wall won't stop drug trafficking - one corrupt border guard can let more contraband through a checkpoint than the rest can seize in a year along the whole Texas-Mexico border.

Hug a drug task force officer - he's having a bad day

If you know a Texas drug task force officer, be especially nice to them today. Give them a hug, perhaps, a shoulder to lean on if they need to talk. It's kind of a rough time for them. You see, today the funding runs out for Texas' Tulia-style drug task forces - Governor Perry has shifted the money to the border and other priorities, leaving them to fend for themselves. There were 51 of these agencies in Texas just a few years ago, at their height employing about 700 narcotics officers. Now most are closing their doors.

The Texas Observer's March 24 issue has an article by Tulia-author Nate Blakeslee on this stunning denouement entitled "End of an Era: The clock runs out on the state's infamous regional drug task forces." He quotes me pretty extensively and even cites Grits' role, calling it, "a clearinghouse for stories of task force malfeasance that Henson culled from small town newspapers and a variety of sources he had cultivated around the state, some of them in law enforcement. 'Grits' quickly became one of the most popular sites for criminal justice reform advocates, not just in Texas, but also in Washington, D.C.." That's a nice plug.

Nate gives me and ACLU of Texas executive director Will Harrell a lot of credit for the task forces' demise - especially for two ACLUTX public policy reports I authored, Too Far Off Task (2002) and Flawed Enforcement (2004) that exposed systemic task force flaws. But the truth is that hundreds of people from maybe a dozen or more different organzations were involved in the movement to end the drug task force system in Texas, which grew out of the organizing and research done in response to the Tulia episode.

At different points in time civil rights groups like NAACP and LULAC chipped in, as did the National Taxpayers Union, the Heritage Foundation and the Drug Policy Alliance in D.C.. Local groups like Tulia Friends of Justice played pivotal roles, along with national columnists like Arianna Huffington and Bob Herbert. My friends at the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition played a huge unsung role. Perhaps most of all, one cannot overstate the important role played by House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee Chairman Terry Keel and his predecessor, now-Senator Juan Hinojosa: Both men saw the task forces' flawed structure and insisted on fixing it, coming back to the topic year after year.

In the end, few thought this outcome was possible. Closing Texas' task forces sends a powerful message: 'Drug war corruption won't be tolerated and if it can't be controlled, we'll shut you down.' In that sense it's a huge win, which is why I told the Observer:

"I consider getting rid of the task forces the political equivalent of Babe Ruth pointing to the right-field fence [before his famous home run]," he said. "We completely changed the way people think about drug enforcement in this state. We said all task forces need to go away, and in just a few years, they're all gone. You don't get many victories that look like that."

See Grits' full drug task force coverage.

Judge spanks Austin council for misleading ballot language

WooHoo! A judge agreed with backers of two citizen initiatives that the Austin City Council's proposed ballot language describing the Open Government Online and Clean Water charter amendments was misleading and must change.

Judge Steve Yelenosky said the ballot language pulled out unrepresentative and sometimes false examples that were solely negative to the point it was tantamount to an argument against the measure instead of a description of it. In particular the judge said the city's portrayal that emails with personal information in them would go online in real time falsely read the amendment, ignoring caveats that gave the City discretion to be practical.

He also said the City's $36 million cost estimate was bogus - the city conceded under questioning the amendment would not require spending at a level that required a tax increase, even though on the ballot the city had predicted property taxes increasing at $.03 on the dollar!

See a more detailed writeup on the Open Government Austin blog, from this morning's Austin Statesman and from blogger Sal Costello.

Egg sucking dog

Do y'all remember this Johnny Cash tune?

Egg sucking dog,
I'm gonna stomp your head in the ground
If you don't stop eating my chickens
You dirty old egg sucking hound.

One of the neighbor's chickens got into my yard this afternoon and my two pit-bull puppies, I'm afraid, did what came natural. Ooops. The younger of the two, Domino, appeared to have been the main culprit

That's right, just to feed as much as possible into the national stereotype of Texans, I did indeed say my "neighbor's chickens" - and I live less than a mile and a half from the Texas state capitol building. You've gotta love Austin, unless, I suppose, you're an overadventurous urban chicken trying to take on a pit bull. That's like the poor fellow who brings a knife to a gunfight.

30 seconds is pretty good ...

Build the much-ballyhooed wall between Mexico and the United States and how long would it take would-be immigrants to breach it? Molly Ivins has expert testimony on the subject:

... it was '83 or some year right around there when we held The Fence climbing contest. See, people talked about building The Fence back then, too. The Fence along the Mexican border. To keep Them out.

At the time, the proposal was quite specific -- a 17-foot cyclone fence with bob wire at the top. So a test fence was built at Terlingua, and the First-Ever Terlingua Memorial Over, Under or Through Mexican Fence Climbing Contest took place. Prize: a case of Lone Star beer. Winning time: 30 seconds.

I tell this story to make the one single point about the border and immigration we know to be true: The Fence will not work. No fence will work. The Great darn Wall of China will not work. Do not build a fence. It will not work. They will come anyway. Over, under or through.

Viva Terlingua!

Gladwell on causes of crime reduction

Cool: Author and New Yorker writer Malcolm Gladwell has a new blog. Read what he has to say defending the "broken windows" theory of crime prevention from the authors of Freakonomics, who responded with this post on their own blog. Gladwell issued a congenial summary retort.

Don't really know where I stand on it - I'm intrigued but not convinced by the Freakonomics explanation, which is an unverifiable inference, but the feel-good "broken windows" theory - "proof" of which is in large part based on New York City's experience under Mayor Rudy Giuliani - does not explain large reductions in crime in other parts of the country that didn't implement those policies.

Interesting debate, though. I'll be checking back at Gladwell's blog regularly, in any event. Kathy's an avid New Yorker reader, while I liked both his books and actually belatedly reviewed The Tipping Point.

Effective Solutions for Texas

My friend Ann del Llano's terrific website, Effective Solutions for Texas, has undergone a Texas-style makeover and added a whole bunch of impressive new content.

See especially the resources she's posted from the Texas Justice Advisory Committee's Third Annual Sentencing Conference in January. I've barely started through some of U. Cincinnatti's Edward Latessa's work on "evidence based" probation practices she has linked, but along with terrific Texas-CJAD specific program information and sentencing-related news stories, it gives anybody who wants to understand the push to overhaul Texas' incarceration-weighted sentencing scheme even more background than sitting through a long legislative hearing (though that's also pretty informative).

Ann posted a newsletter (pdf) from Restorative Justice Ministries Network which announces its upcoming conference April 21-22 in Houston, and also notice of the May 6 "Quality of Life" conference of the Texas Alliance of the Formerly Incarcerated in San Antonio.

Finally, she posts detailed information including results of open records requests to the Governor's office regarding HB 2193, Texas' legislation strengthening the probation system that the Governor vetoed last year.

Ann and I both work with the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition and the ACLU of Texas, so be ye hereby notified of said terrible conflict of interest - then rush over and check out her new digs.

'Judge's role isn't just to be a rubber stamp'

Judges shouldn't rubber stamp plea bargains, writes Judge Susan Criss in the Galveston Daily News responding to a recent editorial (Kuff has the background). Since more than 99% of Texas convictions result from plea deals, I wonder if that's how most judges view it?

Good stuff in the op-ed - read the whole thing.

Prof. Alexandra Natapoff argues persuasively that police use of "snitches" or confidential informants constitutes an "informal" plea arrangment, so it's interesting to read Judge Criss describe what additional protections judicial oversight provides to victims, defendants and the public in the plea bargaining process. She writes:

Judges are required by law to make several findings before being able to accept a deal. If the judge does not accept a plea bargain, the defendant is allowed to withdraw a plea of guilty and enter a plea of not guilty.

Judges must determine if a defendant is knowingly and voluntarily giving up certain constitutional rights and has the mental competence to do so.

I am prohibited by law from accepting a guilty plea if the person claims to be innocent. I have rejected many pleas where that occurred. In some instances the defendant later returned and admitted guilt. In other cases the persons turned out to be innocent.

None of those protections exist when police or prosecutors coerce a confidential informant in more informal settings. The CI might protest their innocence or might not be mentally competent - it doesn't matter because the arrangement never has to pass the judicial smell test. That's particularly true in federal settings.

It's great that Judge Criss could take time off from monitoring probationers at the Galleria to write this piece. :-) She oversaw the case of millionaire killer Robert Durst, then ran into him while shopping in Houston when he was supposed to be under house arrest. Durst was ultimately acquitted of murder (on grounds of self defense) after he killed his neighbor, chopped up the body, and tossed it into Galveston Bay - his wild story and legal journey are one of the oddest you'll ever encounter.

When Grits received notice recently of her new campaign website, I emailed Judge Criss to suggest she add a blog - she politely replied that the campaign kept her too busy, but I see at least she's got the writing bug. We've got plenty of lawyer blogs, but besides Judge Posner, the blogosphere is definitely still short on judges.

USA Today covers 'Stop Snitching' trend

USA Today published a good article on the Stop Snitching movement. ("Anti-snitch campaign riles police, prosecutors," March 29) See prior Grits coverage of snitching here.