INS Extends Jail Inspection Program
A pilot program in which federal immigration agents check inmates at Anaheim Jail for U.S. citizenship will continue at least through the end of June, Immigration and Naturalization Service officials said Wednesday.
The six-month program to screen prisoners who may be deportable was scheduled to end this month. But Richard K. Rogers, district director for the Los Angeles office of the INS, said the agency has agreed to extend the program while the U.S. General Accounting Office studies its effectiveness. The INS will evaluate the program, he said.
City officials say the screening is needed to reduce crime committed by illegal immigrants.
Steve Jost, chief of staff for Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Garden Grove), said Sanchez requested the GAO study because “she wanted to be sure this was the best use of taxpayers’ resources.” A portion of Anaheim is within Sanchez’s district.
But Councilman Bob Zemel said the study is an “obvious effort to kill the program” and said he favored a broader audit that would “cover how the INS is spending all their monies.”
Zemel, a leading proponent of the program, said, “We are identifying violent criminals and repeat offenders who are not being released to the streets of Anaheim because we know who they are up front.”
The federal agents have placed holds on more than 300 people, who face deportation if they are found to be in the United States illegally.
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