Illegal Reentry Cases Dominate LA Fed Prosecutors Caseload

Anna Gorman and Scott Glover in the Los Angeles Times discuss the efforts of federal authorities to focus enforcement efforts immigrants who were previously deported and then reentered the country illegally -- a crime known as "illegal reentry" that now makes up more than one-third of all prosecutions in Los Angeles and surrounding counties, according to their review of U.S. attorney's statistics. The surge in prosecutions reflects the federal government's push in recent years to detect illegal immigrants with criminal records in what may seem the most obvious of places: the state's jails and prisons. Illegal reentry is the single most prosecuted crime in the L.A. U.S Attorney's office. Prosecutors filed 539 such cases in fiscal year 2007, making up 35% of the caseload, compared with 207 in 2006 -- 17% of all cases. Statistics for the first four months of this fiscal year show the trend continuing.

One wonders what crimes are not being prosecuted given the focus on illegal rentry cases.

KJ