Fullerton : Cal State Student Ordered Deported by U.S. Judge

A Cal State Fullerton student, who was arrested by the Immigration and Naturalization Service with the help of campus police, was ordered deported Friday. The arrest had stirred complaints by several Latin student groups.

Mynor Sandoval, who was arrested by an INS officer while on his way to class on March 20, will be sent back to Guatemala within the next 10 to 15 days as the result of a ruling by Immigration Judge William F. Nail in Florence, Ariz.

Sandoval’s case raised concerns by several groups as to the university’s role in assisting an outside agency such as the INS.

In a statement issued in April, Cal State Fullerton President Jewel Plummer Cobb said the university would be legally obligated to cooperate with a federal or state agency looking for people suspected of committing a crime, but they would not have to “assist in cases which relate only to the possible undocumented status of a student.”

Jerry Keating, Cal State Fullerton public information officer, said police acted without consulting with the university’s administrators. In similar future cases, the police would be required to consult with the administration, he said.

In Sandoval’s case, the issue was clouded by a criminal warrant for his arrest. Police in Pittsford, N.Y., had issued a warrant charging him with possession of stolen property. Sandoval had failed to show up for a court appearance July 26, 1984, a Monroe County Sheriff’s Department spokesman in New York said Friday.

INS officials suspected Sandoval, who has been living in the United States since 1971, of being an undocumented resident after he applied for a birth certificate in Texas, Flanders said.

When INS officials contacted their Buffalo, N.Y., office, they found that Sandoval had attended school in New York until he transferred to Cal State Fullerton, Flanders said.

New York police and INS officials contacted campus police, who tracked the student down by checking classes he might take as a Spanish major, said Roger Nudd, the university’s student affairs vice president. A campus policewoman, along with an INS officer, found Sandoval outside a campus building on his way to class.

INS spokesman Joe Flanders said university officials acted properly and if they had not cooperated “they could have been held in contempt.