'Amnesty' for criminals who can't go back home

Burt Hubbard, Rocky Mountain News

Published June 28, 2006 at midnight

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The U.S. doesn't want Gavan Alkadi, and neither does his home country of Iraq.

But for now, Colorado is stuck with him.

The 46-year-old immigrant has been arrested 31 times in Colorado since 1981 for offenses that include DUIs and assaults, according to Colorado Bureau of Investigation records.

Deportation proceedings against him began in 2003 after he was sentenced in 2002 to a year in jail for domestic violence and obstructing police in Boulder County.

But it took two years for his case to move through the immigration appeals system. His deportation order became final in October 2005, but Iraq wouldn't - or couldn't - approve his return travel documents.

So he was released May 16.

Two days later, he was charged with menacing in Weld County.

Alkadi is one of thousands of immigrants with criminal records who are released because their host countries will not take them back, according to a May study by the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general.

The study also estimated there are 136,000 immigrants, all from eight countries, who will likely get de-facto "amnesty" because their countries will not accept them even if the U.S. orders them deported. The eight countries are Vietnam, Jamaica, Iran, India, Ethiopia, Eritrea, China and Laos.

U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., is using Alkadi's case to question why felons are not simply dropped off at their home countries.

"What prevents our government from doing this - simply repatriating the undesirable alien to his own country of origin, regardless of whether or not the receiving government agrees to accept him?" Trancredo asked in a letter this week to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.

Carl Rusnok, spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said Alkadi was back in federal detention Tuesday. He said the agency had no choice but to release him earlier.

Although Alkadi has been arrested 31 times, many of those charges were dismissed.

Rusnok said in a release that the Boulder County assault in 2002 was the first serious felony to trigger deportation because Alkadi was a legal permanent resident. Legal residents of the U.S. can be deported only if convicted of certain "aggravated felonies" as defined by immigration law.

Will Adams, spokesman for Tancredo, said it was unclear whether Iraq refused to issue Alkadi's travel documents or was delayed by bureaucratic problems.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that immigrants ordered deported cannot be detained longer than 180 days if the home countries will not accept them, except in special circumstances. Rusnok said that rule led to Alkadi's release May 16.

On May 18, Alkadi was charged in Fort Lupton with felony menacing. A police report said he threatened the victim with knives. The case is pending.

Between his 2005 deportation order and his release in May, he was also sentenced to two years' probation in Boulder County for drug possession.

"I was shocked to learn recently that Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials in Colorado released a dangerous Iraqi into the community despite his extensive court record," Tancredo wrote.

Rusnok said ICE abided by procedures and court precedents.

Alkadi was detained Tuesday because he failed to report to ICE as required by the conditions of his earlier release, Rusnok said. Tancredo told the News he thinks his letter precipitated the arrest.

Alkadi's case is not unique, according to the federal report. In many cases, countries such as China and Iran impose such onerous documentation and travel requirements that they block the deportees' return, the report said.

Tancredo said it is time for the U.S. to deport them anyway.

"We cannot be a haven for all of these crooks," he told the News.

hubbardb@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-5107

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