Anaheim to Welcome INS Return to City Jail

A program to check inmates at Anaheim City Jail for citizenship will be restored as a result of the immigration bill signed by President Clinton this week.

City officials lobbied heavily to include the six-month pilot program in the final version of the bill, which makes Anaheim the only city in the country to have Immigration and Naturalization Service agents stationed at its jail to screen for illegal immigrants.

“I think it sends a signal that if you’re an illegal alien, you’d better not commit a crime in Anaheim,” said Councilman Tom Tait, a lead backer of the program.

Councilman Bob Zemel, who has been in the forefront of the effort, said, “I’m just ecstatic that the process works, and for someone at my level to actually go back to Washington, D.C., and write the bill and lobby for the bill, gives me chills that our government process really works.”

Zemel and Tait and other city officials made trips to Washington last year to meet with congressmen to get the INS program at the jail.

Meanwhile, in March, at the insistence of Anaheim officials, INS placed two agents at the jail for a trial period.

To the dismay of city officials, the agents were pulled from the program in July, after an INS study found that 24% of those arrested in Anaheim were in the country illegally and were arrested for minor offenses. That figure was deemed too low to justify keeping an agent in the jail permanently.

Kristine Thalman, the city’s intergovernmental relations officer, said landing the pilot program in Anaheim is an “unprecedented and huge accomplishment.”

“From an internal lobbying standpoint, I cannot recall having a bill introduced, going through the committee process, passing the House and Senate and having the President sign it in less than a year.”

Thalman said the legislation, part of the appropriations bill, goes into effect immediately. She said the program may start before the end of the year after details are worked out with the U.S. Department of Justice.

Virginia Kice, an INS spokeswoman, said Tuesday that “no decisions have been made at this point. . . . We need to study the language and determine how we’re going to go forward.”

Thalman said that under the program, suspects picked up by police will be screened before going to court and the judge will be informed if the defendant is in this country illegally or has been previously deported.

“They will go through an INS screening regardless of color, race and sex,” Zemel said. “The key is if they are illegal, the case is flagged and the judge is made aware they have an illegal alien and there is a flight risk.”

After the six-month program is over, city officials hope that it will continue.

“If it’s successful, we certainly will fight to keep it,” Tait said.