DEPORTATION CONSEQUENCES FOR RURAL COMMUNITIES
Good afternoon honored members of the House of Representatives Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere and guests. My name is Marsha Garst and I am the Commonwealth's Attorney of Rockingham County and the City of Harrisonburg, Virginia. With the exception of college and law school and working here in the Nation's Capitol, I lived my entire life the beautiful Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. As with all communities that face growth, change also follows. As the population of our community grows, deportation of criminal illegal aliens has increased. Sadly, criminal aliens are re-entering our community and committing new crimes. I am here today to discuss my experience with the deportation process and the need for better communication processes to assure that our communities are safe from illegal alien serial offenders.
Many immigrants from Latin America have come to Rockingham County and the City of Harrisonburg to seek employment in our poultry industry and agricultural economy. Some of the immigrants are here legally. However, others are here illegally and have family members and friends with criminal proclivities. Once these individuals run afoul of the law, then arrests follow. We have an excellent relationship with our local ICE office. The agents assist with determining at our jail whether suspects are illegal aliens and that information is passed on to the prosecution to assure that this is considered to assure appropriate bond conditions. After our criminal process is complete, then we assume that the deportation process will assure that will no reenter the United States, especially the Shenandoah Valley. I am here to address the consequences of deportation of dangerous felons that re-enter our community and present safety concerns and reoffend.
One particularly tragic case involved the death of a local school teacher, Jason Morris. An illegal alien had been convicted of drunk driving and released. Several months later, that same illegal alien drove at over 100 miles per hour with a blood alcohol level over three (3) times the legal limit. Mr. Morris died in the crash. Now that we have a local ICE office and cooperation pre-trial, I feel that the tragedy above may have been averted.
One issue we are facing is assuring that once dangerous criminals are deported that they do not re-enter our community. We have seen particular problems with re-entry in gang and drug cases. When I began prosecution in 1994, organized gangs were an anomaly and methamphetamine was just becoming the rural drug of choice. Currently, the City of Harrisonburg and County of Rockingham has a Gang Task Force. This task force has a coordinator with whom I have worked for a decade, Sgt. Chris Rush. He kindly provided the following statistics. When I previously testified before this honored body in 2005, our community had only ten (10) known gangs and one-hundred (100) known members. As of June 2007, the City of Harrisonburg and Rockingham County has twenty-five(25) active gangs with over four-hundred and fifty (450) known members. About twenty-five (25) percent of the gang members are suspected illegal aliens. We have had two(2) recent cases where gang members were arrested and deported and re-entered the United States and our community to reoffend. I am sure that their home country would have liked to prohibit such activity as well.
Even more so, we see re-entry of dangerous criminals in the drug trade. Approximately forty (40) percent of methamphetamine seized in the State of Virginia was seized in Rockingham County and the City of Harrisonburg. We have had five (5) recent cases of methamphetamine dealers being convicted, deported, and reentered to sell more methamphetamine in our community. In the beginning of July of this year over four (4) pounds of methamphetamine was sold hand to hand by an illegal alien. Once deported, I hope that he will not re-enter and bring his poison with him.
Since 1994, and more particularly since 2005, I have seen great improvement between Federal Government and local government communication in identifying and deporting dangerous criminals. I hope that efforts will now focus on working with alien home countries to assure that re-entry is neither commonplace nor accepted.
Thank you for your attention to these issues and thank you for your time.
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