It hasn't been politically
correct for them to say it, but local law enforcement
people are clear that illegal Hispanic immigrants are
involved in a big proportion of Reno's most high-profile
violent crimes. One recent example in the news
is Saul Pina, the 16-year-old charged with raping a
16-year-old girl on the Sparks High campus May 8. Another
is Juan Castillo, the young gunman charged with shooting
a 12-year-old girl last year in Horseman's Park. But
even local law enforcement professionals have been
surprised by the number of illegals being turned up by a
new joint program between the Reno Police Department and
the federal Immigration and Naturalization Service. "There's
no question, especially in the street crime that we deal
with," says Reno Police Chief Jim Weston, that
"there's a large population of illegal aliens
involved with the local youth gangs. "It's
a much greater number than we anticipated." Since
last August, when the joint program began, he said, about
120 Reno gang members have been deported back to their
native countries. All of them were 18 or older and many
were some of the most violent criminals in the area. "Actually
our criminal justice systems isn't as effective as the
deportation process, in keeping some of these kids out of
the [Reno] community or off the streets," said
Weston, adding he believes the new program has had a
large impact, locally. Weston
took pains to characterize the program as not one
"that targets minorities or Hispanics. It's just
using any tool that's available to get the criminal gang
members out of town. And it's been one of the more
effective ones we have found." J.
T. Watson, officer in charge at the local Immigration and
Naturalization Service office, told Electric Nevada that
he had begun advocating something similar to the current
program shortly after his posting to Reno in mid-1993. It
took a while for the idea to gain support, he indicated,
because back then "the gang problem wasn't anywhere
near as bad as it's gotten to be." Another
reason for the reluctance, he said, was "this
feeling that if you get the Immigration Service involved,
people in the Hispanic community will just be quiet, they
won't deal with you, they won't call the police for help
and so forth. And that's a valid concern. "I
would never want to diminish that concern,"
continued Watson, "but I think we've all seen now
[that] the Hispanics are the ones getting preyed upon ...
and if we're removing those people who are doing that ...
it helps the Hispanic community probably more than any
other." Not
only are many of the most violent gang members Hispanic,
he said, but two of the major Reno gangs are Hispanic
gangs. Thus
the consensus for the joint program that Reno police and
the INS came up with last August. The program involves
the assignment by the INS of local special agents to ride
and work with the Reno Police Department's Community
Action Team, which works to suppress violent gangs. "As
you might well expect, the P.D. has a very good grasp on
who are and who are not gang members," said Watson,
adding that "the Community Action Team [does] more
than just arrest gang members -- they also work on
community activities and so forth. It's a complete and
full approach to the problem." That
is why, he indicated, the INS takes its lead from the
Reno police when the combined Reno police-INS teams
confront Hispanic gang members. Usually
that involves, he said, approaching "those
individuals that, for whatever reason, the CAT team wants
us to talk to, to deal with, et cetera." The
procedure is for the INS agents talk to the identified
individuals, going through the normal INS procedures to
determine whether or not the individuals are aliens, and
whether or not they are deportable from the United
States. "Based
upon what we find from that, we have one or more courses
of action that we can take," said Watson, indicating
it depends on whether the gang members have been arrested
or not. In
the case of gang members who have not actually been
arrested but do turn out to be here illegally, the
deportation process proceeds normally. But
"in many cases, the time we talk to the gang members
is after they have been arrested. In [the case of] those
individuals, we will not complete our processing until
they're done with the state. "We
have always worked in the criminal arena after people
have been arrested and convicted," said Watson,
"and so [with] those gang members who have been
arrested and either 
convicted or are awaiting trial, we go ahead
and start our process.
"But
with those individuals we will not complete our
processing until they're done with the state."
As
an example, said Watson, "let's take the young man
who's being tried for shooting the 12-year-old girl in
Horseman's Parks last year.
"If
he's found guilty and sentenced to prison, he will serve
out his time before we attempt to remove him from the
United States."
Under
what is called "the institutional hearing program,
we might very well have the hearing while he's in
prison."
In
that program, Watson explained, "the judge actually
goes to the prison, we have lawyers representing the
government that go to the prison," and the hearing
takes place within the institution's walls.
Whether
the young man will be deported, said Watson most likely
will be up to the Immigration judge.
"If
he is, the day he walks out, I'll have officers there
with a warrant for his deportation .. and we will
immediately remove him from the United States.
"Of
course the advantage of this is that, if we weren't doing
this, we'd have to meet them at the prison door, and we'd
have to pay to detain them all over again while they go
through the deportation process."
That
process, he said, "has certain appeal rights where
things can go on for months, if not years. So by doing
that in the prison, we wind up saving the taxpayers a lot
of money in the long run."
Both
Police Chief Weston and the INS's Watson agreed that it
is too early yet to tell how big a dent the new program
is placing in Truckee Meadows violent crime.
Nevertheless, both believe the impact may be substantial.
There
are some indications, said Watson, that word on the
street about the program and what "some of these
kids are seeing [with their] friends" is making a
difference.
"I'll
give you a classic example," he said, "that's
right in the news now -- the two boys arrested in Sparks
for the rape at Sparks High School.
"One
of those individuals is a United States citizen; the
other is an illegal alien." Both are now in custody
at Wittenberg Hall, the county juvenile detention
facility.
"So now he's at Wittenberg, we have [an INS]
retainer placed on him, we've already interviewed him,
[and] we've completed the paperwork to set in motion his
deportation from the United States.
"We've
already done that, just this week ... but in doing that,
now we find out that his mother and father are here
illegally.
"So
part of what the police preach to these kids -- and they
do a lot of community action things with these kids, --
[is that] if you're here illegal, and you screw up, and
you come to INS's attention, [and] if mom and pop and
brothers and sisters are illegal, all of you are gonna
go."
"I
don't know whether that may help deter young folks from
getting involved in trouble," said Watson, but he
said the strong family ties among Hispanics made him
think it could -- and hope it will -- do so.
Watson
said that from last August until about two months ago,
one of his special agents was assigned to work with the
Reno gang unit essentially full-time.
But,
"approximately 2 months ago," he said, "we
assigned another officer part time.
"For
us, it's a major commitment, because I only have four
special agents, and I've got one and a half basically
working full time on the gang issue with Reno P.D."
In
another new local INS program, Watson said, a full-time
INS person has been assigned to the Washoe County
Detention Center north of town on Parr Boulevard.
"Last
week was the first time we had him actually writing up
people at the county jail," he said.
"Our
plan is to give a 100 percent coverage to the county
jail, checking any one who's incarcerated there to find
out if they're here legally or illegally.
"We
think we will probably pull quite a few illegal aliens
from that."
Watson
said Reno is his seventh duty station with the INS.
Before coming here he was assigned to Laguna Niguel,
south of Los Angeles.
Asked
about all the innovative programs, he said, "I'd
like to tell you that all these are my ideas, but most of
them came from my staff.
"The
only thing I can tell you is that we run an open-enough
office so that people can come forward with new ideas.
"And
if they sound good, we try 'em."