Street roots., October 19, 2018, Page 7, Image 7

Street Roots • Oct. 19-25, 2018
2018 ELECTIONS
Page 7
want local police to arrest people who steal.
Saying there’s a cause and effect with
immigration status and more crimes - that
hasn’t been brought up by the statistics.
Sheriffs’ letter: Mollie Tibbetts’ recent
murder has refocused attention on the violence
and heartbreak illegal-immigrant criminals can
visit on Americans and their families. Tibbetts’
killer ‘was here because our government
neglected its responsibility to keep him out,’
writes Agnes Gibboney (whose son, Ronald Da
Silva, also was murdered by an illegal
immigrant). Oregon’s sanctuary statute not only
compounds that neglect, but issues a de facto
invitation to illegal immigrants to settle in our
state.
B arilla’s response: These are isolated
incidents. They’re atrocious, I am sorry. I
want to make sure anybody - immigrant, non­
immigrant, U.S. citizen - gets punished by
the criminal system if they commit a crime.
Especially murder. The law specifically says
that local police can enforce criminal laws. I
had local police help me draft this, help me
with the wording - they supported the bill. It
was non-controversial. It was a bipartisan-
supported bill.
The lawmaker who wrote Oregon’s sanctuary statute
31 years ago, Rocky Barilla, rejects Oregon Sheriffs’ claims
1970s. After graduating from University of
California School of Law in Los Angeles, he
BY EM ILY GREEN
SENIOR STAFF REPORTER
ix teen O
S
r e g o n . l e t t e r in
August urging Oregonians to vote yes
on Ballot Measure 105 to repeal
Oregon’s sanctuary status law.
This state statute prevents local law
enforcement agencies in Oregon from using
their resources to enforce federal
immigration laws.
According to the sheriffs’ letter, it
also prevents local law enforcement
from pursuing perpetrators of
immigration-related crimes such as
identity theft and encourages “illegal
im m igra n t criminals” to settle in Oregon.
Their letter also called the opposition’s
arguments that the law makes Oregon safer
and its repeal would lead to racial profiling,
“nonsense.”
Street Roots asked the lawmaker
who authored Oregon’s sanctuary law
31 years ago to respond to some of
the claims
made in this
letter -
they’re the
same
‘Those
are
not
logical
conclusions’
argum ents
proponents of
the measure use when trying to convince
voters to support i t
On O ct 11, we sat down with former Rep.
Rocky Barilla on the Oregon House floor,
where in 1987 he proposed the law while
serving as the state’s first elected Latino
legislator.
At the time, Barilla said, Latinos were
frequent victims of strategic racial profiling.
Local law enforcement agencies often set up
roadblocks and conducted traffic stops in
Latino neighborhoods, checking those who
looked Hispanic for proof of citizenship.
Barilla became aware of Oregon’s profiling
problem when he moved to Salem in the
took a ^ ^ a t M a r i o n ^ l k L ^ aT S er^ ace s m
Salem and began to hone his skills in
immigration law.
In 1977, a U.S. citizen named Delmiro
Trevino sought Barilla’s services after Polk
County sheriff deputies humiliated and
harassed him in an Independence restaurant
while they interrogated him and his friends
about their immigration status. Barilla filed
suit and later credited the case as being the
catalyst for the bill that today stands as the
nation’s oldest sanctuary law.
Barilla represented South Salem for one
term and two months in Oregon Legislature
before losing his reelection bid and moving to
California with his wife. He went on to work
for the California Teachers Association for
more than two decades. Since retiring eight
years ago, Barilla has reinvented himself as
an author, spending much of his time in the
Bay Area writing novels.
We read claims from the sheriffs’ letter to
begin our interview, followed with Barilla’s
responses.
Sh eriffs’ letter: Certainly, immigration-law
violations are federal offenses. But they are
precursors to other crimes illegal immigrants
routinely commit in their efforts to conceal their
illegal presence - crimes, like identity theft, that
harm everyday Oregonians at the local level.
Such crimes are well within local police and
sheriffs’ purview. But Oregon’s ’hands o ff
sanctuary statute works to keep law enforcement
from pursuing many of the people who commit
them -fo r the very reason that they are here
illegally, and innocent Oregonians pay the price.
Rocky Barilla’s response: One, those are
not logical conclusions. As I’ve read the
studies, immigrants have a lower crime rate
than normal citizens. No. 2, the law
specifically allows local police to enforce
criminal laws. I want people to feel safe. I
Sheriffs’ letter: Another pro-sanctuary
argument is that the statute’s repeal would
make illegal immigrants afraid to report crimes.
... More nonsense. Can any sanctuary
supporter, áte a single instance of an illegal
immigrant being deported for reporting a
crime?
B a r illa ’s r e s p o n s e : Absolutely. P eople aré
b ein g a rre s te d u n d e r the new ad m inistration
and (U.S. Attorney General Jeff) Sessions in
courthouses, on school grounds and
hospitals. We’re arresting grandmothers at 6
a.m. in the morning. That creates a chilling
effect in people trying to cooperate with local
police and district attorneys.
There are no sanctuary places where this
is not happening. The current administration
is more concerned about numbers rather
than human rights.
Sheriffs’ letter: Last and most nonsensical
and insulting of all to the men and women who
have sworn to preserve the peace - is the
assertion that sanctuary repeal would unleash a
wave of profiling against Hispanics. First, all
across the State, law enforcement officers
undergo formal rigorous training which
includes antiprofiling training. More
importantly however is this: People who choose
to devote their lives to law enforcement are
people of uncommon integrity.... (They) will
continue to do their jobs with integrity and
don’t believe for a minute, they won’t!
B arilla’s response: I respect law
enforcement I think that in order for
Oregonians to understand what the values
are and what’s at risk, the community and
local police have to work together. Basically,
local police are members of the communities.
They have children, they have spouses, their
kids go to school - everybody, undocumented
or whatever, they want safe places to live.
This law does not prevent police from
enforcing laws.
But local police should not enforce federal
criminal laws. I’ll give you an example:
Income tax. Let’s say somebody has an
income tax form, they’re filling it out; they
add two dogs as dependents. Well, that’s a
See BARILLA, page 13