Immigrant complains about Police, gets deported
"Waheed Saleh says he was smoking a cigarette outside a doughnut shop at the rough edge of Riverdale in the Bronx when a police officer handed him a summons for disorderly conduct. He protested, he says, and the officer yelled at him to go back to his own country.
Mr. Saleh, a Palestinian, worked as a gypsy-cab driver illegally seeking fares and was used to tickets for infractions like double parking, making U-turns and picking up passengers. But he believed that this officer, Kishon Hickman, was harassing him. So he complained to the Civilian Complaint Review Board, which examines complaints against police officers.
Before he heard back from the board, however, he heard from federal immigration authorities. About a year later, outside the same doughnut shop on the night of Dec. 20, 2004, he was confronted by a federal immigration agent and local police officers. The police took him into custody on administrative immigration violations, sending him into deportation proceedings. Mr. Saleh believes it was retaliation for his civilian review board complaint.
Now, this tiny interaction between cabbie and police officer has turned into something with potentially far larger ramifications: it appears to be the first test case of Executive Order 41, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's two-year-old effort to reassure the city's immigrants that they can seek help from city agencies without fear of reprisal based on illegal immigration status. The order essentially codified a "don't ask, don't tell" policy for city workers.
Whatever the outcome - the police deny retaliation, and the review board rejected Mr. Saleh's claim of harassment - the case reveals that two years after Executive Order 41 was issued, there is no real mechanism in place to independently enforce it, to punish violators or even to investigate complaints like Mr. Saleh's, which was detailed by his lawyers at the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund in a letter received by the Mayor's Office on Immigrant Affairs last week."
Disgraceful.
From The New York Times.
Mr. Saleh, a Palestinian, worked as a gypsy-cab driver illegally seeking fares and was used to tickets for infractions like double parking, making U-turns and picking up passengers. But he believed that this officer, Kishon Hickman, was harassing him. So he complained to the Civilian Complaint Review Board, which examines complaints against police officers.
Before he heard back from the board, however, he heard from federal immigration authorities. About a year later, outside the same doughnut shop on the night of Dec. 20, 2004, he was confronted by a federal immigration agent and local police officers. The police took him into custody on administrative immigration violations, sending him into deportation proceedings. Mr. Saleh believes it was retaliation for his civilian review board complaint.
Now, this tiny interaction between cabbie and police officer has turned into something with potentially far larger ramifications: it appears to be the first test case of Executive Order 41, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's two-year-old effort to reassure the city's immigrants that they can seek help from city agencies without fear of reprisal based on illegal immigration status. The order essentially codified a "don't ask, don't tell" policy for city workers.
Whatever the outcome - the police deny retaliation, and the review board rejected Mr. Saleh's claim of harassment - the case reveals that two years after Executive Order 41 was issued, there is no real mechanism in place to independently enforce it, to punish violators or even to investigate complaints like Mr. Saleh's, which was detailed by his lawyers at the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund in a letter received by the Mayor's Office on Immigrant Affairs last week."
Disgraceful.
From The New York Times.
posted by Thomas Brown at
7:27 AM
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