McClatchy; IMMIGRATION OFFICIALS DETAINING, DEPORTING AMERICAN CITIZENS

[babylonsister]

Immigration officials detaining, deporting American citizens
By Marisa Taylor | McClatchy Newspapers

* Posted on Thursday, January 24, 2008



FLORENCE, Ariz. — Thomas Warziniack was born in Minnesota and grew up in Georgia, but immigration authorities pronounced him an illegal immigrant from Russia.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has held Warziniack for weeks in an Arizona detention facility with the aim of deporting him to a country he's never seen. His jailers shrugged off Warziniack's claims that he was an American citizen, even though they could have retrieved his Minnesota birth certificate in minutes and even though a Colorado court had concluded that he was a U.S. citizen a year before it shipped him to Arizona.

During a deportation hearing Thursday morning, pleas by Warziniack's family and lawyer to release him, as well as a copy of his birth certificate proving his citizenship, did little to deter the government.

"The immigration agents told me they never make mistakes," Warziniack said in a phone interview from jail. "All I know is that somebody dropped the ball."

The story of how immigration officials decided that a small-town drifter with a Southern accent was an illegal Russian immigrant illustrates how the federal government mistakenly detains and sometimes deports American citizens.

U.S. citizens who are mistakenly jailed by immigration authorities can get caught up in a nightmarish bureaucratic tangle in which they're simply not believed.

MORE...

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/25392.html

[Alexander]

1. Sounds like any one of us could be next.

:scared:

[Richard Steele]

2. By today's standards, Kafka was a down-to-earth optimist.

[mmonk]

3. Yeah. Not the first time in those immigration "sweeps".

[ret5hd]

4. i wonder if i could convince everyone that i'm a french, german, or canadian?

A southern drawl doesn't seem to be a problem.

[DCKit]

5. Sucks that I'm totally unable to fake a Kiwi accent or speak fluent French.

On edit: Or DUTCH

:evilgrin:

[cutlassmama]

6. OMG!

[melody]

7. "the burden of proof" is on the citizen?????? Since when???

This is terrifying.

[kurth]

20. Stupid ICE spokeswoman Virginia Kice should be fired

[tbyg52]

8. Unbelievable - oops, no, just business as usual.... nt

[Vogon_Glory]

9. Would It Be Too Much To Hope That Agents Make The Same Judgement Call w/Michelle Malkin? n/t

[NNN0LHI]

10. This may be a situation where actually someone WITH a criminal record might be better off?

If someone has already went through the criminal justice system and been deemed an American citizen and it has been documented that the person is a citizen that question is off the table.

Weird huh?

Don

[pitohui]

13. he had a criminal record but he TOLD them he was a russian

it's a long article i know, but even if you skim, you learn that apparently at some point whilst withdrawing from heroin he began to make wild claims about his previous life as a colonel in the russian army and other wild tales to puff up his importance

he now claims he doesn't remember telling these tall tales and maybe he doesn't but when a man has multiple stories and multiple claims about his name and ID then yes, hilarity can ensue

he sort of created his own mess from the sound of it

[NNN0LHI]

15. I tend to agree with you

he sort of created his own mess from the sound of it

Yep.

Don

[warren pease]

11. Where do I apply?

[pitohui]

12. wasn't there a cheech and chong movie about this? EOM

,

[kelligesq]

14. something is missing from this story. criminal record? how can

a person who is born in America be deported to Russia. Are his parents legal
Americans. Something is just not right.

[Zywiec]

16. From the article it says:

After he was arrested in Colorado on a minor drug charge, Warziniack told probation officials there wild stories about being shot seven times, stabbed twice and bombed four times as a Russian army colonel in Afghanistan, according to court records. He also insisted that he swam ashore to America from a Soviet submarine.

He was definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

[DearAbby]

18. He was definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer...

If anyone believed that story....I dont think he is the only one :shrug:

He swam ashore to America from a Soviet submarine?? :rofl:

[Orwellian_Ghost]

17. K&R n/t

[EFerrari]

19. Told ya.

This is horrendous and we have to remember that whatever the jackboots do to "them" -- whatever "them" it is -- they will next do to us.

[indepat]

21. Amurikkka, Amurikkka, God shed his grace on thee!