The Fight of Our Lives: La Lucha de Nuestras Vidas June Newsletter

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Secure Communities or a National Albatross? FFF Members say no to "Secure Communities"

“I think we don’t have security in our communities because you can’t contact police for any rea!"#$%&'%(")%*"+%(")%,#*%(")-!./'% in more trouble by calling them.”

“S-COMM does nothing to create real security but rather the illusion of security at the expense of immigrants.

It puts fear into immigrant communities so that they are afraid to cooperate 0123%"-%45//%23.%6"/14.+%"-%.7.#%23.%,-.% department, or an ambulance make the community less safe for all of us.”

“Secure Communities would decimate the already precarious trust that minorities have in the police, given the current Stop & Frisk policies that have subjected more than 500,000 people a year to needless harassment.

S-COMM would make our immigrant populations even more more reluctant to engage the police with legitimate concerns.”

Secure communities aura un impact négatif dans notre communauté. Nous ne sentirons pas la sécurité contacter la police. Nous devons arrêter le programme maintenant.

“Comunidades Seguras trayera mas problemas a la comunidad inmigrante de los que ya tiene.”

End S­COMM: Fighting for Justice: We Will Do Anything to Keep Our Families Together However, racial profiling happens before we get arrested not when we are getting fingerprinted. NYPD already has a program called ‘Stop and Frisk’ that relies on our appearances and stereotypes to make decisions about whether to approach us. It is legalized racial profiling.

Recent studies have demonstrated that S­Comm does in fact motivate the police to profile, knowing that many of us will get thrown into deportation as a result of our arrests, no matter what eventually happens in our criminal cases. Contrary to ICE’s propaganda about targeting violent criminals, their own records show that 80% of people deported due to S­Comm have no criminal records or were picked up for lower level offenses. Contrary to NYPD’s rhetoric about searching for guns and drugs, nine out of ten people stopped were totally innocent, meaning there was no conviction. Not a single gun is retrieved in 99.9 percent of stops. Stop and Frisk not only violates our rights but strips us of our dignity in front of our family and friends. We live in a police state: that is the only “threat to our society”.

Infographic created by Reneé Feltz and Stokely Baksh for DeportationNation.org Please note this infographic is from 2011 before more counties activated S-COMM

S­Comm with Stop and Frisk needs to be terminated to save the New York City we know and love.

Mayor Bloomberg recently commented on S­Comm, “If the federal government has a law and you don’t like it, change the law.” We plan to do just that. Whether that’s crossing the Mojave, swimming the Rio Grande, or fighting for justice to change the laws, one thing is clear; we will do anything to keep our families together.

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“I think we don!t have security in our communities because you can!t contact police for any reason. If you do, you find yourself in more trouble by calling them.”

“S-COMM does nothing to create real security but rather the illusion of security at the expense of immigrants.

It puts fear into immigrant communities so that they are afraid to cooperate with or call the police, or even the fire department, or an ambulance make the community less safe for all of us.”

“Secure Communities would decimate the already precarious trust that minorities have in the police, given the current Stop & Frisk policies that have subjected more than 500,000 people a year to needless harassment.

S-COMM would make our immigrant populations even more more reluctant to engage the police with legitimate concerns.”

Secure communities aura un impact négatif dans notre communauté. Nous ne sentirons pas la sécurité contacter la police. Nous devons arrêter le programme maintenant.

“Comunidades Seguras trayera mas problemas a la comunidad inmigrante de los que ya tiene.”

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Infographic created by Reneé Feltz and Stokely Baksh for DeportationNation.org Please note this infographic is from 2011 before more counties activated S-COMM

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The Fight of Our Lives

May Day 2012! Tens of Thousands Take to The NYC streets

La Lucha De Nuestras Vidas

All Photos by Graham Macindoe

this issue

Families

for Freedom

S­Comm and Stop and Frisk: A Threat to Society­

35 W. 31st St #702 NY, NY 10001 646 290 8720

How Does S­COMM Work?

a letter by ED Abraham Paulos

FFF members say no to S­COMM May Day Photo Report

familiesforfreedom.org

Upcoming Events June/July 2012 6/7 War On Immigrants Report WBAI Radio 10PM­11PM 99.5FM WBAI.org 6/13 World Day of Prayer Visits Families for Freedom 6/14­6/28 Human Rights Watch Film Festival http://ff.hrw.org/ 6/16 Father’s Day Vigil Union Square 1­3PM 6/17 End Stop & Frisk Silent Vigil for Father’s Day 110th Street & 5th ave 1PM 6/22 2PM Turning Point Webinar: History and Lessons Learned from the ‘96 Immigration Laws

Founded in September 2002, Families for Freedom is a New York­based multi­ethnic defense network by and !"#$ %&&%'#()*+$ !(,%)'$ ()-$ .'/*%)'$ -01"#*(*%")2$ 30$ (#0$ %&&%'#()*$ 1#%+")0#+$ 4-0*(%)00+56$ !"#&0#$ %&&%'#()*$ 1#%+")0#+6$*/0%#$7"80-$")0+6$"#$%)-%8%-9(7+$(*$#%+:$"!$-01"#*(*%")2$30$,"&0$!#"&$-";0)+$"!$,"9)*#%0+6$(,#"++$ ,")*%)0)*+2$<<<$+00:+$*"$#010(7$*/0$7(=+$*/(*$(#0$*0(#%)'$(1(#*$"9#$/"&0+$()-$)0%'/>"#/""-+?$()-$*"$>9%7-$*/0$ power of immigrant communities as communities of color, to provide a guiding voice in the growing movement !"#$%&&%'#()*$#%'/*+$(+$/9&()$#%'/*+2 <<<$/(+$08"780-$%)*"$()$"#'()%;%)'$,0)*0#$('(%)+*$-01"#*(*%")2$30$(#0$($+"9#,0$"!$+911"#*6$0-9,(*%")6$()-$ ,(&1(%')+$!"#$-%#0,*7@$(!!0,*0-$!(&%7%0+$()-$,"&&9)%*%0+$AA$7",(77@$()-$)(*%")(77@2

7/7 Families Members Meeting at Office 2­4PM

The activation of Secure Communities (S­Comm) last month basically put New York City in the same category as Arizona, whose recent law, SB 1070, is regarded as the most draconian immigration law in the country. That is because in New York City, S­Comm is combined with the New York Police Department’s (NYPD) policy of Stop and Frisk. While NYC police officers cannot ask us our immi­ gration status, they don’t Today, the have to; a quick trip to police precincts the precinct can give them are virtual lmmigra­ that information. Today, the tion checkpoints, police precincts are virtual driving us further immigration checkpoints, into the shadows of driving us further into the ($1"7%,0$+*(*02 shadows of a police state.

The NYPD always submits our fingerprints to the Federal Bureau of Investigation for routine criminal history checks.

What’s new is that under S­Comm the prints are shared with the Department of Homeland Security, so that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) can deter­ mine if we are subject to deportation. ICE then transfers immigrants straight into the unjust detention and depor­ tation system. As immigrants, we are treated as second class citizens in our own criminal proceedings. Because of S­Comm, we are routinely denied bail, jailed for longer periods, and disqualified from alternative release and treatment programs. We then get funneled as commodi­ ties into an unjust detention and deportation system that profits off our misery and separates us from our families.

Had this program been implemented during my unlawful arrest in 2010, I wouldn’t be here today. I was picked up in Brooklyn on my way home from work for a robbery I couldn’t have—physically or logically—committed. I was then processed through the criminal justice system as if I was a product in a manufacturing assembly line. I was fingerprinted at the precinct, booked at Central Booking and then spit out at Rikers Island, all in a matter of days.

Under S­Comm ICE would have immediately been alerted regardless of the fact the current charges were ultimately dismissed, I would’ve been held without bail.

The reason is because ICE considers me a “criminal alien” because I’m not a citizen and I have past convic­

tions. It does not matter how long an immigrant has lived here or how old the convictions may be. My experience is not unusual. As a young black male in New York City my story of incarceration is a dime a dozen. As an immigrant of color this is our new reality. We live in a racist society where immigrants and people of color are criminalized regardless of guilt or innocence. This criminalization strips us of our right to be human beings which then makes it easier to stop, detain and deport us as if we are animals. And if we are considered animals, the police are on safari, the jails are our cages and if we are exotic enough, we then get shipped to distant foreign lands.

In New York City, as immigrants we are your neighbors, family, and friends. However, the Statue of Liberty is no longer a beacon of refuge for immigrants today but rather a cruel joke. New York City is home to more than 8 million people, about 40% of whom are foreign­born. Almost half of all Queens residents were not born in the U.S. New York City has the largest population of black immigrants, the largest Asian Indian population in the western hemi­ sphere and the highest total Asian population of any U.S. city. Many of the New Yorkers that were deported last year were part of families who have been established for generations and provided the labor that has built this great city. Immigrants “Secure have been coming to this city Communities” for centuries. We come dis­ is a euphemism placed from our countries of for ethnic and origin, only to find ourselves #(,%(7$1#"!%7%)'2$ now getting harassed in our neighborhoods by racist poli­ cies like Stop and Frisk and then getting permanently dis­ placed by deportation programs like S­Comm. S­Comm, like Stop and Frisk, is a threat to the ethnic and racial make­up of New York City.

Secure Communities is a euphemism for ethnic and racial profiling. S­Comm applies to immigrants regardless how or why we were arrested and whether or not our arrests were based on profiling. ICE claims that Secure Communities “…reduces opportunities for racial or ethnic profiling because all people booked into jails are finger­ printed.” (letter by ED Abraham Paulos)