Not So Fast, Ed

Ed at Captain's Quarters doesn't think much of a WND article on illegal aliens and crime.

Those claims usually get reported at some point by World News Daily, a hardline conservative news service, which doesn't usually miss an opportunity to relay the latest wild-eyed claim. Today, WND reports that Rep. Steve King (R-IA) put out 'statistics" that illegal immigrants murder over 4,000 Americans every year:

Ed is right to say that we should not demonize illegal immigrants just for the sake of scoring points against illegal immigration. But if WND's numbers aren't to be trusted, neither are the quick thumb-nailed gross population numbers Ed uses in his post to suggest the WND article is absurd. You can see both sets at the links above. But let's look at some real numbers.

From the Center for Immigration Studies:

In Los Angeles, 95 percent of all outstanding warrants for homicide (which total 1,200 to 1,500) target illegal aliens. Up to two-thirds of all fugitive felony warrants (17,000) are for illegal aliens.

That data alone tells you you can't use Ed's gross population numbers of illegal immigrants versus national crime. Clearly there are densely populated areas where illegal immigrants are responsible for an incredibly high proportion of violent crime.

A confidential California Department of Justice study reported in 1995 that 60 percent of the bloody 18th Street Gang in California is illegal (estimated membership: 20,000); police officers say the proportion is undoubtedly much greater. The gang collaborates with the Mexican Mafia, the dominant force in California prisons, on complicated drug distribution schemes, extortion, and drive-by assassinations, and is responsible for an assault or robbery every day in Los Angeles County. The gang has dramatically expanded its numbers over the last two decades by recruiting recently arrived youngsters, a vast proportion
illegal, from Central America and Mexico.

Here's a pdf file from the US House of Representatives. It discusses the incredible crime problem in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley as a result of gangs comprised of mostly illegal immigrants. The Shenandoah Valley is not East LA, yet the crime problem is large and ugly, involving multiple murders.

This below via NewsMax quoting reliable identified sources:

"The U.S. Justice Department estimated that 270,000 illegal immigrants served jail time nationally in 2003. Of those, 108,000 were in California. Some estimates show illegals now make up half of California's prison population, creating a massive criminal subculture that strains state budgets and creates a nightmare for local police forces."

Citing an Urban Institute study, director of research for the Center for Immigration Studies Steven Camorata noted in 2004: "Roughly 17 percent of the prison population at the federal level are illegal aliens. That's a huge number since illegal aliens only account for about 3 percent of the total population."

Federal Prisons aren't reserved for jay walkers and that last item suggests illegal aliens are incarcerated there at almost six times their percent of the gross population. This below from Captain's Quarters:

If King and WND have their numbers correct, that would mean that illegals commit 26.2% of all murders in the US. However, they only comprise less than 7% of the American population, even if one accepts the figure of 20 million illegals here now. Doesn't that seem just a bit strange to anyone?

Using Ed's 7% of population and the proportionality of serious crime among illegal immigrants, I certainly wouldn't feel comfortable saying they weren't responsible for potentially 20-something percent of murders.

Back to NewsMax:

"In March 2000, Congress made public Department of Justice statistics showing that, over the previous five years, the INS had released over 35,000 criminal aliens instead of deporting them. Over 11,000 of those released went on to commit serious crimes, over 1,800 of which were violent ones [including 98 homicides, 142 sexual assaults, and 44 kidnappings].

From California to New York and Heather Mac Donald's reasonably well-known article on illegal aliens and crime:

On September 5, 2001, his handpicked charter-revision committee ruled that New York could still require that its employees keep immigration information confidential to preserve trust between immigrants and government. Six days later, several visa-overstayers participated in the most devastating attack on the city and the country in history.

New York conveniently forgot the 1996 federal ban on sanctuary laws until a gang of five Mexicans—four of them illegal—abducted and brutally raped a 42-year-old mother of two near some railroad tracks in Queens. The NYPD had already arrested three of the illegal aliens numerous times for such crimes as assault, attempted robbery, criminal trespass, illegal gun possession, and drug offenses. The department had never notified the INS.

Is anyone 100% positive of the impact illegal aliens have on serious crime? Maybe not. After all, on both Federal and State levels, the concept of sanctuary cities combined with civil rights apologists have done an effective job of covering them up. So much for America's right to know.

What I do know from just Googling a little bit beyond the WND article is that, whatever the impact, it's pretty darned serious. And who can forget the most heinous crime America has ever seen, the one on 9/11. What was the murder rate that year when a handful of illegal aliens murdered almost 3,000 of us in less than an hour?

Comments

[The Liberal Avenger]

WND and NewsMax are the first places I look when I need cold, hard, unbiased facts from organizations without agendas.

[larry]

saaaay, what newspaper did walter duranty work for? i'll bet it was one of those internet 'news' services, wasn't it.

[Purple Avenger]

Sounds fishy. Clearance rates for murder are usually in the 70%+ range, so you'd expect maybe 2,500 each year to be packing the prisons allowing for some few dribblers who beat the rap.

I'd go with prison inmate admittance data and factor that against the yearly murder totals for something closer to reality. Need INS data on deportations too. Some might be extradited back before they make it to a US prison.

WND's batting average while above the Mendoza line, isn't anything to brag about ;->

[daveinboca]

Lou Dobbs undergoes a hit piece in the current New Yorker by iconic Secular-Progressive Commissar Ken Auletta, largely for adopting a "populist" stance on illegal aliens' pervasive presence in the US spreads from border regions to the entire country as a whole.

And the story above concerning Rep Steve King of Iowa's research into Illegal Alien Murders supports a lot of the local news down here in South Florida, where drug wars are starting to proliferate as murderous Mexicans fight over turf.

The only good thing about the murder rate, above the death rates from Iraq and Afghanistan for US troops, is that a lot of the murders are of illegal aliens by illegal aliens. But many law-abiding American citizens are killed by illegal aliens, and more by drunk drivers who are illegals driving without valid licenses.

My house was robbed recently by some Jamaican illegals, who also broke into a house down the block. Of course, the Palm Beach DA cannot be bothered with the cases, as he is much more concerned with Rush Limbaugh's prescription violations. The PC runs the constabulary down here in Florida, and no local dead-tree press or TV news outlets like to dwell on the high percentage of illegals involved in murder, robberies, and car crashes.

I hope this story gets picked up by Dobbs and Buchanan and even the increasingly gun-shy O'Reilly, who is starting to mince and prance in a PC fashion in order to pick up more viewers and sell more books.

[Nikolay]

"What was the murder rate that year when a handful of illegal aliens murdered almost 3,000 of us in less than an hour?"
???
What had 9/11 to do with illegal aliens? Do you think terrorists on 9/11 had problems with their legal status? Do you believe that such a massive and complicated terrorist attack as 9/11 could be committed by people that were in the country illegally? This is a really a gross case of demonization of illegal aliens.

[Nikolay]

"What was the murder rate that year when a handful of illegal aliens murdered almost 3,000 of us in less than an hour?"
???
What had 9/11 to do with illegal aliens? Do you think terrorists on 9/11 had problems with their legal status? Do you believe that such a massive and complicated terrorist attack as 9/11 could be committed by people that were in the country illegally? This is really a gross case of demonization of illegal aliens.

[DANEgerus]

(D)emocrats want illegals to provide the votes Americans won't.

[Dan Riehl]

Do you think terrorists on 9/11 had problems with their legal status?

What books have you been reading?

[J'hn1]

I found a logic error of Ed's and added this to his comments
Quote
I have spotted two points where you have (I believe) inadvertently conflated terms.
First, you have substituted Murders for Murderers.
Since it is likely that some number of the second class would be responsible for more than one of the first, this leaves an inaccurate number for the second
Then, you bring in the number of Caucasian convicted murderers. as compared to the theoretical illegal murderers. Since the number of convicted murderers is not equal to (or greater than) the number of murderers (illegal or otherwise) this also skews the picture you provide.
So # illegal murders > illegal murderers > convicted illegal murderers does mean that comparing the quantity of murders attributed to illegals to the percentage of convicted causasian murders that happen to include most of the illegal class ( and there are illegal murders not of the caucasian variety such as Malvo) is disengenous.
End Quote
In his evaluation, each convicted murderer has been caught, and each one has committed a single murder. I believe that to be extremely unlikely
Since each convict would represent a larger number of murderers some of whome were not caught, and each murderer has an average murger rate of greater than one murder each due to some committing more than a single murder, even without non causanian murderers (such as Lee Boyd Malvo) this allows for the number of illegal murderers in jail to be significantly less than the 100% comparison to the Hispanic/Causasian single category as now compiled by the Feds.

[waiv]

NewsMax:
"The U.S. Justice Department estimated that 270,000 illegal immigrants served jail time nationally in 2003. Of those, 108,000 were in California"

Department of Justice: "At midyear 2003, 34,456 Federal inmates were noncitizens, representing over 20% of all prisoners in Federal custody.
California (18,559), Texas (8,702), New York (8,370), Florida
(4,739), and Arizona (3,670) held almost 80% of all noncitizens
confined in State prison." The data includes both legal and illegal immigrants.

Obviously Federal Prisons aren't reserved for jay walkers, neither they're reserved for murderers since most homicides fall within the juridiction of the states unless:

"If the victim is a federal official, an ambassador, consul or other foreign official under the protection of the United States, or if the crime took place on federal property or involved crossing state borders, or in a manner that substantially affects interstate commerce or national security"

By the way, about the "95% of the outstanding warrants for homicide..." I'd like to point out that they never give a source for that, and in the case they do, it's usually a hoax (Los Angeles Times, INS/FBI report 2006) or a source that cannot be verified (confidential report, they told me by phone).