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Federal Prosecutions On Record Pace

By Som Lisaius, KOLD News 13

During a helicopter ride-along with the United States Border Patrol, a group of illegal immigrants is apprehended in the Southern Arizona desert.  The time is about 12:30 in the afternoon.  Yet the immigrants still might make it home in time for dinner.

"They'll probably be back in Mexico by 4 or 5 this evening." one agent says, shaking his head.

That was a couple years ago.  It isn't nearly as easy for illegal border crossers today.  While apprehensions are actually down this year, prosecutions against illegals are up--way up, in fact.

In March, 9,350 illegals were prosecuted in federal court.  That's nearly three times the total, compared to March of last year.  So what's going on?  And why is the hammer suddenly so heavy?

The federal government calls it Operation Streamline, which calls for mandatory prosecutions and mandatory sentencing for all illegal immigration activity.

To give you some idea what that's done to the federal courts, a total of 16,298 cases were prosecuted at the federal level in March.  Of that, 9,350 were against illegal immigrants.  Drug offenses accounted for 2,674 federal prosecutions.  While white collar crimes came in a distant fourth with just 702 cases.

As you might imagine, some people feel this is gross misuse of taxpayer dollars.  Before Operation Streamline, an estimated 9 million dollars a month was spent on illegal immigration cases.  Right now, that figure's all the way up to 22 million dollars a month.

And advocacy groups like Derechos Humanos say that's an absolute travesty.

"It is imperative that we find alternatives to the prosecution only mentality and divert the money that would have otherwise gone to unscrupulous private contractors, back into the effort to find reasonable and sustainable immigration reform," says Helain Day of Derechos Humanos.

To cut down on illegal immigration, some might says it's all worth it.  But here's an interesting statistic.  Of those convicted of immigration offenses, their average jail sentence is about one month.  That's a lot of money, a lot of time and a lot resources, for what's essentially a slap on the wrist.