3/4/2018 - Ron Hosko Townhall.com
In a development that’s
reflective of the widening chasm of viewpoints on the treatment of illegal
aliens in America, a big city mayor, Oakland’s Libby Schaaf, issued a public
warning of impending Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) immigration
sweeps.The arrests went forward anyway, netting more than 150, including
several wanted for serious and violent crimes.
Acting ICE boss Tom
Homan wasted no time in calling the mayor the equivalent of a gang lookout and
pointing to the difficulties ICE faces in “sanctuary” jurisdictions like
Oakland and San Francisco, saying, “Because these jurisdictions prevent ICE
from arresting criminal aliens in the secure confines of a jail, they also
force ICE officers to make more arrests out in the community, which poses
increased risks for law enforcement and the public.”
Homan is right.
Liberal mayors like Schaaf, ever-willing to see illegal immigrants only
as victims, are working harder than ever to poke Washington, D.C., and its law
enforcers in the eye. Today, Schaaf is at the epicenter, prodding and
testing, claiming moral high ground while ignoring the basic expectations of a
sovereign nation and recklessly dismissing the increased risk to ICE agents
trying to do a difficult job.
Just across the bay, a
dark reality of illegal immigration is entering its next phase.
There, on the touristy
Embarcadero three years ago, a beautiful American dreamer named Kate Steinle
strolled with her father. Without warning, she was on the ground bleeding
to death and begging him for help – an experience no child or parent should
ever have to suffer.
The man responsible for
Kate’s death, at the age of 32, was Jose Ines Garcia Zarate, a Mexican man
illegally, yet consistently, on U.S. streets despite seven felony convictions
and five prior deportations.
Garcia Zarate was lined
up for yet another removal in early 2015 when transferred by federal
authorities to San Francisco to face a local 20-year-old marijuana charge. When
that charge was dropped, San Francisco authorities opted to release him
pursuant to their sanctuary city policies rather than return him to ICE
custody. Within weeks, Kate Steinle was cut down by a bullet, fired from
a gun he was handling, on that San Francisco pier.
Garcia Zarate’s is a
case study in the failure of sanctuary policies that have overspread the
country and whose most vocal proponents seem to reside in California. The
Mexican career criminal has more experience with the American criminal justice
system than any graduating law school student could hope for. The cost of
investigating his acts; of charging, prosecuting and defending him; and the
cost of detaining and imprisoning him if even for all-too-brief periods, has
undoubtedly rolled into seven figures, all borne by the taxpayer.His is the
face of border insecurity, the face of massive taxpayer expense, and, for
innocent Kate Steinle, the face of a grim reaper.
This killer has had all
the benefits of the American courts and will get even more in the months ahead.
Rightly hedging the
federal government’s bet on whether a San Francisco jury would convict Garcia
Zarate of the most serious charges in Kate’s death, the Feds indicted him late
last year for being a felon in possession of a firearm. They guessed
right. In December, the jury acquitted Garcia Zarate of murder and
manslaughter charges which, even in California, might have imprisoned him for a
long time. Instead, the criminal illegal was found guilty only of illegal
weapon possession and in January, Garcia Zarate, facing a maximum sentence of
three years in prison, was sentenced to time served.
It’s now the Feds’
turn, where a conviction could bring 10-year sentences for each of two counts.
This time, Garcia Zarate will have the federal taxpayer-funded free ride
while having his actions defended by talkative attorney J. Tony Serra, who
plans to put the president on trial instead of his client. Serra is already
on record saying, “A vote for guilty in the federal case is a vote for Trump,”
adding, his client is “being made a martyr to the racist
perspective of Trump.”
Serra is wrong. A
vote for guilty could well be a vote for restoration of the rule of law, a vote
for justice, a vote to hold a repeat criminal alien accountable for his own
actions.
Regardless of the
federal outcome, mouthy Tony Serra and Libby Schaaf will succeed on one front –
their twisted views are being heard and are helping push the divide over
America’s illegal alien management issues wider.
Liberal politicians
like Schaaf and those in San Francisco who’ve wrapped themselves in the sanctuary
policies that put Jose Ines Garcia Zarate back on the street to steal Kate
Steinle’s promising life have themselves evaded criminal charges despite their
complicity. They wantonly ignore the potential harm to their own
citizens, claiming greater concern about the separation of family members who
are unlawfully in the country.For many, that noble notion crumbles with the
realization that Kate Steinle’s separation from her family is permanent.
Garcia Zarate will come back; Kate can’t.
Meanwhile, the
attention-seeking Oakland mayor is hard at work widening the illegal
immigration divide as she puts federal immigration agents at increased risk.
Ron Hosko is president
of the Law Enforcement Action Network and a former FBI assistant director.
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