Undocumented Immigrants draining Welfare system? A lie or a Lie.

Again is beyond belief the Anti Immigrants group are narrow minded towards facts and myths regarding draining social services like Welfare, Medicare, and Medicaid. Just a few facts for them; Are you there Lou Dobbs? Glenn Beck, Minuteman Groups? Read these facts:

A former Alabama Department of Human Resources employee from Prichard pleaded guilty this week to using her position to steal hundreds of dollars in food stamps, the attorney general's office announced Tuesday.

Three other Mobile County women also were convicted this week on charges of welfare fraud, according to a news release from Attorney General Troy King.

Elanda Stallworth, 57, admitted to charges of second-
degree theft of food stamp benefits or money from DHR and that she intentionally used her position for unlawful personal gain, the release states. She pleaded guilty in Mobile County Circuit Court on Monday. Stallworth apparently used her own computer to steal six checks worth $149, or a total of $894, King said. Source:


Attorney General Troy King today announced the convictions of three women in Mobile County Circuit Court for charges of welfare fraud.
“When people lie to receive welfare benefits to which they are not entitled, they are committing a crime against the State, the taxpaying public, and those who are truly deserving of welfare benefits,” said Attorney General King. “I take seriously my responsibility as Attorney General to protect public funds on behalf of the people of Alabama and pledge to prosecute those who break the law by abusing the welfare system.”

Chantell Robinson, 33, of Mobile, pleaded guilty today to third-degree theft of property in the amount of $1,401. She was sentenced to one year, which was suspended, and placed on probation for two years. The court ordered her to pay full restitution to the State of Alabama.

Tosha Lee, 32, of Chickasaw, pleaded guilty today to third-degree theft of property in the amount of $4,867. She was sentenced to one year, which was suspended, and placed on probation for two years. The court directed her to pay full restitution to the State of Alabama.

Shirley Ann Blackmon, 44, of Mobile, pleaded guilty yesterday to second-degree theft of property in the amount of $4,617. She was sentenced to three years, which was suspended, and placed on probation for three years. The court ordered her to pay full restitution to the State of Alabama.

The Attorney General commended Assistant Attorney General Noel Barnes and Senior Special Agent Assie Webb for their work in handling these cases. Attorney General King also thanked the Department of Human Resources in Mobile County for its assistance in preparing information and referring the matter to the Attorney General’s Office for review and appropriate action, noting in particular Rose Johnson, director of Mobile County Department of Human Resources; Avis Buford, caseworker, Mobile County DHR; Leon Kennedy, claims worker, Mobile County DHR; and Geraldine W. Turner, claims supervisor, Mobile County DHR.

Johnson stated, “We work to have our Food Stamp program deliver timely benefits to eligible individual’s and appreciate the Attorney General prosecuting those who illegally receive benefits. Every dollar given fraudulently takes away from those truly in need. We want the public to have confidence in the administering of these programs and appreciate prosecution when appropriate.”

The Mobile County cases are part of a continuing statewide effort by Attorney General King to aggressively investigate and prosecute welfare fraud. Prosecutions are pending in approximately 38 counties, including Baldwin, Clarke, Monroe, Escambia and Conecuh counties. Source:


Couple plead guilty to welfare fraud

A Shingletown couple have pleaded guilty to welfare fraud and are due to be sentenced March 24, a prosecutor said Tuesday.

William Wallner, 34, pleaded guilty Monday to welfare fraud and perjury in two separate cases, and is to be sentenced to three years in prison, Deputy District Attorney Michael Hemker said.

Teresa Wallner, 34, pleaded guilty to two counts of welfare fraud and is to be sentenced to 180 days in jail, he said.

Between 2004 and 2008, the couple were overpaid nearly $30,000 in welfare benefits for failing to report job and unemployment income, Hemker said. Source:

Polygamous Sect are the largest funded groups from Medicare and Medical.

If you are going to have three wives and 15 children, you need to figure out a way to support three wives and 15 children. Source:

Undocumented Immigrants draining social services? A lie or a Lie.

I really question the Notion or lie that Undocumented Immigrants draining social services or brankrupt Hospitals.

If they were too old to work chances are they would not be here. And if they can not work due to some physical problem chances are they would not be here either. The vast majorities of Undocumented Workers entering U.S. are between 18-30 years old and are fit for work. I think the stats on this so-called social services drain is more fiction than fact. And again if a few they are not paying their fair share of the taxes you can not blame them, they do not sending the tax money, the employer does.

I will continue exposing the fact that Hospitals, CEO's, Managers, vendors, Suppliers, even some Doctors are the burden and the major factor of draining U.S. social services and not the Undocumented Immigrants.

Condell Medical Center in Libertyville, Ill., is to pay $36 million to settle allegations it accepted improper payments, federal prosecutors said Monday. The settlement resolves allegations the center accepted improper payments from Medicare and Medicaid programs for more than five years. Continue reading here:

A federal judge in Houston on Monday also ordered 55-year-old Edem James Etuk to repay nearly $1.6 million to Medicare and Medicaid. Continue reading here:

An Alabama court has ordered two major drug companies to pay the state more than $114 million after finding them guilty of Medicaid price fraud. Continue reading here:

Walgreen Co., owner of Walgreens Pharmacy, has agreed to pay $35 million to settle a federal lawsuit accusing it of defrauding Medicaid by switching patients onto more expensive drugs, Continue reading here:

A doctor who claimed he provided Medicare and Medicaid-covered services in Martinsburg - more than 250 miles away from his office near Parkersburg, W.Va. - has been named in a 157-count indictment by a federal grand jury in Martinsburg. committed mail fraud by devising a scheme to defraud in an attempt to obtain about $2.25 million from Department of Health and Human Services programs. Continue reading here:

Are you follow me; Continue reading because this is not the ending.

The former president of the Nevada State Medical Association, the state’s largest physician advocacy group, is one of six Las Vegas doctors who have repaid a total of $625,000 to the federal government to resolve allegations of Medicare fraud stemming from an apparent kickback scheme. who allegedly performed unnecessary services and then submitted claims to Medicare, the federal government’s insurance program for people who are disabled or over age 65. Continue reading here:

An investigation into what the authorities say was a scheme that used homeless people to bilk tens of millions of dollars from federal and state health insurance programs began four years ago with a tip from a rescue mission employee. federal agents raided three private for-profit hospitals — Los Angeles Metropolitan Medical Center, City of Angels Medical Center, and Tustin Hospital and Medical Center in Orange County — in connection with an alleged fraud scheme involving federal Medicaid and state Medi-Cal health insurance programs. Agents arrested Dr. Rudra Sabaratnam, owner and chief executive of City of Angels Medical Center, and Estill Mitts, who is accused of recruiting patients from his Skid Row storefront church, the 7th Street Christian Day Center. Mr. Mitts posted $25,000 bond and is confined to his home. Dr. Sabaratnam posted $700,000 bail. Continue reading here:

Bayer HealthCare will pay $97.5 million plus interest to settle allegations that it paid kickbacks to 11 diabetic supply companies in a "cash-for-patient" scheme, and caused those suppliers to submit false claims to Medicare. Continue reading here:

Health care continues to top the government's list of federal fraud investigation priorities, yielding the lion's share of recoveries in false claims cases in 2008.

The latest figures from the Dept. of Justice show enforcement officials recouped $1.34 billion in settlements and judgments under the False Claims Act in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30. Of that total, $1.12 billion, or 84%, came from health care entities. The act gives federal officials authority to prosecute fraudulent billing of any government program.
That number represents a drop from the $1.54 billion in recoveries reported in 2007 and a record $2.2 billion in 2006. But that doesn't mean federal prosecutors have let up efforts to combat health care fraud, said Russell Hayman, a partner and health care fraud expert with McDermott Will & Emery LLP in Los Angeles.
The government tallied its biggest returns in 2008 from settlements with pharmaceutical firms Merck & Co. Inc. and Cephalon Inc., and managed care company Amerigroup, with recoveries ranging from $225 million to $361 million.

But what was the outcome and consecuence of the Narrow minded, and Anti Immigrant sentiment? coming soon...

Undocumented Immigrants draining Social Services?. A Myth or a Lie?

HEALTH CARE COMPANY OWNER PLEADS GUILTY TO MEDICAL IDENTITY THEFT AND MEDICARE FRAUD.


WASHINGTON – A La Crescenta man pleaded guilty today to federal criminal charges of defrauding Medicare by using patients’ Medicare identification numbers without their knowledge, Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal Division Matthew Friedrich and U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California Thomas P. O’Brien announced. Between August 2003 and April 2008, Melkon Gabriyelyan, 51, billed the Medicare program for more than $1,640,000.

Gabriyelyan pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated identity theft and one count of health care fraud before U.S. District Judge Manuel L. Real in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. Judge Real scheduled Gabriyelyan’s sentencing for Jan. 12, 2009. At sentencing, Gabriyelyan faces a maximum term of 12 years in prison for his crimes.

According to the plea agreement, Gabriyelyan admitted owning and operating TA Medical Supply, a durable medical equipment (DME) company located in the Tujunga area of Los Angeles. In his plea agreement, Gabriyelyan acknowledged that beginning in January 2004 he fraudulently billed Medicare for DME purportedly supplied to Medicare beneficiaries. Gabriyelyan submitted false claims to Medicare for orthotic braces, power wheelchairs and other DME that were not delivered to Medicare beneficiaries, were not prescribed by the physicians listed on the claims that he made or were not medically necessary.

Gabriyelyan also acknowledged in the plea agreement that to accomplish the fraud he knowingly and willfully stole the identity of a Medicare beneficiary for the purpose of submitting false claims. He admitted billing a back brace and two knee braces that the beneficiary did not need or receive, and that the patient had no knowledge of. In addition, Gabriyelyan admitted that he created a patient file for this beneficiary that contained a delivery slip with the beneficiary’s forged signature.

“Medical identity theft is a growing problem that poses significant harm to both the Medicare program and the patients whose personal information is stolen,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich. “The Department will continue fighting to protect the rights of Medicare patients as well as prosecuting individuals who defraud the Medicare program.”

“Medical identity theft is a striking example of the kind of fraud we are combating in the Los Angeles area. One new weapon in our arsenal is our Strike Force operations, which seek not only to protect American taxpayers from Medicare fraud, but protect the private and personal information of all patients,” said U.S. Attorney Thomas P. O’Brien.

Gabriyelyan was arrested in May 2008 following an investigation by the Medicare Fraud Strike Force (MFSF). The MFSF is a multi-agency team of federal, state and local prosecutors and agents designed to combat Medicare fraud. Strike force operations began in the Los Angeles area on March 1, 2008. The MFSF is led by the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section in Washington, D.C., and the office of U.S. Attorney Thomas P. O’Brien of the Central District of California. Since the inception of MFSF operations in 2007, federal prosecutors have indicted 104 cases with 184 defendants in both Los Angeles and Miami. Collectively, these defendants fraudulently billed the Medicare program for more than half a billion dollars.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Margaret L. Carter, and is being investigated by the FBI; the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Inspector General; the California Department of Justice; the Bureau of Medical Fraud and Elder Abuse; and the Los Angeles County Health Authority Law Enforcement Task Force.

Undocumented Immigrants draining the Social Services? A lie or a lie.

I had seen more often the tip of the Iceberg when Hospitals, Corporations, Vendors and Suppliers has been the most abusives of the Medicare and Medicaid System were money is flying out the pocket of taxpayers as well as Legal and Undocumented Immigrants.

DME DEFENDANTS SENTENCED IN MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR MEDICARE FRAUD SCHEME

R. Alexander Acosta, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, Jonathan I. Solomon, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Miami Field Office, Christopher B. Dennis, Special Agent in Charge, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General, Miami Regional Office, and Bill McCollum, Attorney General, State of Florida, announced that defendants Mabel and Abner Diaz , of Miami Lakes, FL were each sentenced today to fourteen years’ incarceration for conspiracy to commit health care fraud and health care fraud. Defendant Suleidy Cano , of Hialeah, FL was sentenced to eleven years’ incarceration for conspiracy to commit health care fraud and aggravated identity theft.

According to the parties' joint factual statement in support of the plea, the fraud involved durable medical equipment (DME), which is equipment that can be used in the home on a repeated basis for a medical purpose. Where DME is prescribed or ordered by a physician, an authorized Medicare provider who supplies the equipment to a Medicare beneficiary may be eligible for reimbursement by Medicare.

Abner Diaz and Mabel Diaz co-owned and operated All-Med Billing Corp., a Miami medical billing company, where Cano worked as a biller. All-Med submitted claims to Medicare on behalf of suppliers who purportedly provided DME to Medicare beneficiaries. All-Med submitted $419,935,692.74 in fraudulent claims for DME purportedly provided to Medicare beneficiaries by 85 DME suppliers. These claims were for equipment that not been ordered by physicians or delivered to the beneficiaries as claimed. As a result of these claims, Medicare paid the suppliers approximately $148,586,919.99.

Mr. Acosta commended the investigative efforts of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General, and the Office of the Attorney General, Medicaid Fraud Control Unit. This case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Marc Osborne and Joseph Shumofsky

Terrorists crossing thru the Mexican Border? Myth or a lie?

Virginia Man Sentenced to 22 Years in Prison on Weapons of mass destruction and Explosives Charges Following Arrest on Capitol Hill

WASHINGTON— A Virginia man has been sentenced to 22 years in prison following his conviction on multiple weapons charges, including possession of explosives and the attempted manufacture or possession of a weapon of mass destruction near the U.S. Capitol in January 2008, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeffrey A. Taylor and U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) Chief Phillip D. Morse Sr. announced today.

Michael Stephen Gorbey, 38, received the sentence earlier today in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia before the Honorable Gregory Jackson, who said “it was only by the Grace of God that nobody was hurt.” The court also stated that “there is a very dangerous side” to Gorbey.

Gorbey was found guilty on May 19, 2008, by a Superior Court jury of unlawful possession of a firearm by a convicted felon; two counts of carrying a dangerous weapon; possession of an unregistered firearm; eight counts of possession of unregistered ammunition; possessing, transporting or transferring explosives; and attempted manufacture or possession of a weapon of mass destruction. This case marks the first time that the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia charged a person with attempting to manufacture or possess a weapon of mass destruction based upon the local District of Columbia statute that was passed in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Evidence at trial showed that on Jan. 18, 2008, Gorbey drove into the District of Columbia after being told that he could not get an appointment with U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. Gorbey had purportedly requested an appointment with the Chief Justice to tell him about a massive government conspiracy that Gorbey believed included attempts on Gorbey’s life. After driving into the District of Columbia, Gorbey parked his truck several blocks away from the Supreme Court. The defendant then put on a bullet-proof vest and armed himself with a pump-action shotgun, 27 rounds of shotgun ammunition and a sword that was nearly three feet long. Gorbey then started walking down First Street, NE, towards the U.S. Supreme Court. A citizen alerted officers who confronted Gorbey at gunpoint. After ignoring several orders to drop his weapon, the defendant finally placed the shotgun on the ground and officers took him into custody.

Officers located Gorbey’s truck in the unit block of D Street, NE, and a trained canine indicated there were explosives inside of the truck. Members of the USCP Hazardous Devices Unit detonated a small charge inside of the truck to disrupt a suspected bomb, and then searched the truck. The officers did not locate any explosives; however, they did locate approximately 750 additional rounds of ammunition. After the search of the vehicle by the bomb technicians, the vehicle was towed to a government facility in the District of Columbia, where it was secured for further investigation. Three weeks later, officers conducted a more thorough search of the truck after obtaining a search warrant. During this search, a crime scene search officer located a homemade bomb behind the bench seat of the truck. The bomb was made out of a bottle of lead shot and a box of shotgun shells that were duct-taped to a metal can of black gunpowder. This device was disrupted using a high-velocity stream of water and the remnants of the bomb were sent to the FBI’s forensics laboratory in Quantico, Va. An expert who examined the device found what appeared to be a small hole in the can that could have been used to hold a fuse for the bomb. This same expert testified that if detonated, the device could have caused death or serious bodily injury to multiple people.

“Today’s sentence recognizes the significant threat that Gorbey posed to the public at large and to those government officials he believed had offended him,” said U.S. Attorney Taylor. “As the court noted today, but for the professionalism and patience of the uniformed members of the U.S. Capitol Police, this could easily have developed into a deadly confrontation. This case serves as an important reminder of the risks that law enforcement officers take each day to protect the citizens, employees and institutions of the Nation’s Capitol.”

“I am very proud of the U.S. Capitol Police officers who successfully prevented a dangerous felon from inflicting harm to our community,” said USCP Chief Morse. “We also want to thank the Assistant U.S. Attorneys for their outstanding work and prosecution of Gorbey. These outstanding efforts and the combined teamwork have resulted in getting a felon off the streets.”

In announcing today’s sentence, U.S. Attorney Taylor and USCP Chief Morse commended USCP Liaison Sergeant Wayne Howell who coordinated efforts to interview dozens of officers who were involved in this case; USCP Criminal Investigators Mark Crawford, Joseph DePalma, Dennis Holland and Hugh Thatcher; USCP Uniformed Officers Peter Geyer, Deeben Kang, Daniel Nutter, Bryan Carter, Ryan Gainey, Tony Buffington, David Berkeley, J. Creekmur and Matthew Tighe; USCP Evidence Technicians Jonathan Klipa, Mark Schwalm, Paul West, Frank Pollack, Lonnie Lane, Matthew Shelfo and Joel Hobbs; USCP Hazardous Devices Unit members Sergeant Michael DeCarlo, Sergeant Charles Wood, Robert Simpson, Yusef Norris, Robert Simmons, Daniel Aranyosi, Anthony Sancho and Peter Schulze; USCP Officers Shannon Gadsby and Melissa Allison; Joint Terrorism Task Force members Special Agent Patrick Race, Special Agent Michael Matten, Special Agent Aidan Garcia and Special Agent Bryan Hayes; and the FBI Supervisory Special Agent Daniel Hickey, who testified at trial as the government's expert witness on explosives and explosive devices. In addition, U.S. Attorney Taylor and USCP Chief Morse cited the efforts of several members of the U.S. Attorney’s Office staff, including Litigation Services Technicians Timothy Linders and Errol Spears; Paralegal Phalyn Hunt; Intelligence Analyst Larry Grasso; and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Jennifer Kerkhoff and John Cummings who investigated and prosecuted the case.

Tax Evasion. Undocumented Immigrants Undermine trust not paying taxes? A Myth or a Lie?

below is an interesting video on the current problems our country is facing with tax evasion. According to the video, the government loses about $100 billion in revenue from tax evasion, which makes up a huge part of the tax gap. Just for comparisons sake, $100 billion is more than what the federal government spends on education and training, triple what they spend on the environment and natural resources, and nearly five times what they spend on temporary assistance for families in need. Thanks to the American News Project.
Ignorance and the Intolerance against the Unknownn remains the powerful weapons against our Society.

New Hampshire said NO to a bill HB1614. NO; TO NEW ID SYSTEM TO ENFORCE FEDERAL RESPONSABILITIES.



HB1614 would require that state officials enforce federal immigration and set up a new ID system to require proof of citizenship. It would also create criminal penalties for those who assist undocumented immigrants.

Supporters said this would fight Undocumented immigration, identify theft and protect our jobs. Opponents said it shifts the federal responsibility and the cost of stopping Undocumented immigration to the state, local police and businesses. It also encourages ethnic profiling and criminalizes the act of aiding illegal immigration, which is only a civil violation.

The House killed the bill, 241-79. A yes vote opposed the bill. Read bill here:

When Hospitals are going out of business.!!! Undocumented Immigrants Are always to be blame for. Hypocrisy is not a family value.!!!!!!!






THREE FORMER HOSPITAL EMPLOYEES PLEAD GUILTY TO MULTIMILLION DOLLAR FRAUD

R. Alexander Acosta, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida and Jonathan I. Solomon, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Miami Field Office, announced that defendants Joanna Delfel , Victor Garcia , and Sylvia Oramas, three former employees of Kendall Regional Medical Center (“KRMC”), a full-service hospital located in Miami-Dade County, Florida, pled guilty today to charges of conspiring to defraud KRMC of more than $5 million through a sophisticated purchase order scheme. Specifically, the defendants pled guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1349. If convicted, each defendant faces a maximum term of imprisonment of twenty years. Sentencing is scheduled for January 8, 2009 at 8:30am before United States District Court Judge Patricia A. Seitz.

As part of the plea, the defendants admitted that from January 2001 until May 2007, they defrauded KRMC by utilizing their knowledge of, and access to, HCA’s computerized supply management system. Specifically, the Defendants manipulated the computer system so that KRMC would issue payments to two outside medical supply vendors, The Pharmed Group, Inc. (“Pharmed”) and Allied Medical Products, Inc. (“Allied Medical”), for medical supplies that were fraudulently ordered, and never actually delivered. To execute the scheme, the Defendants used the computerized supply management system to generate phony purchase orders for medical supplies, and to falsely record that such supplies had been delivered-in-full to KRMC by Pharmed or Allied Medical. Based on these false and fraudulent computer entries, KRMC’s parent company, HCA, Inc. (“HCA”), paid Pharmed and AMP the full amount for the false supply orders, totalling more than $5 million. The fraud proceeds were funnelled back to the Defendants and other co-conspirators through a series of shell corporations, including Soho Marketing, Inc. (“SoHo Marketing”), and Gator Sports Collectibles, Inc. (“Gator Sports”), controlled by members of the conspiracy. Members of the conspiracy then issued checks from SoHo Marketing and Gator Sports to the defendants and other members of the conspiracy and created fraudulent documents to disguise these payments as employee compensation.

Mr. Acosta commended the investigative efforts of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He also acknowledged the cooperative efforts of Kendall Regional Medical Center and its sister HCA affiliates for their assistance in this investigation. This case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Ryan K. Stumphauzer

The thruth about Undocumented Immigration and crime. The myth created by Anti Immigrants, Extremists, conservaties, xenophobics, like Lou Dobbs, Pat Buchannan, Tom Tancredo and many more.

Anti-immigration forces have been hammering into our heads the dangerous link between illegal immigration and increases in violent crime. Their only problem: the facts don't support their alarmist contentions.

"Some of the most violent criminals at large today are illegal aliens." That's the lead sentence of a policy report published by the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, DC institute that provides intellectual ammunition to the anti-immigration forces.

Another CIS study led with a similarly impressionistic assertion about the immigrant-crime link: "In recent years, it has become difficult to avoid perceiving immigrants, legal or not, as overwhelming this country with serious crime."

CIS is not alone in relying on impressions to form opinions about just how illegal immigrants are. On the basis of fear-mongering stories rather than scientific studies, groups like the Center for Immigration Studies have succeeded in convincing the media and the U.S. public that undocumented immigrants are criminals. A National Opinion Research Center survey found in 2000 that 73% of Americans believed that immigrants were casually related to more crime.

But, as in other dimensions of the immigration debate, the facts don't support the alarm.

There have been dozens of national studies examining immigration and crime, and they all come to the same conclusion: immigrants are more law-abiding than citizens. A 2007 study by the Immigration Policy Center (IPC) found that immigrants, whether legal or illegal, are substantially less likely to commit crimes or to be incarcerated than U.S. citizens.

Ruben G. Rumbaut, coauthor of "The Myth of Immigrant Criminality" study, said: "The misperception that immigrants, especially illegal immigrants, are responsible for higher crime rates is deeply rooted in American public opinion and is sustained by media anecdotes and popular myth." According to Rumbaut, a sociology professor at the University of California at Irvine, "This perception is not supported empirically. In fact, it is refuted by the preponderance of scientific evidence."

The Immigration Policy Center study found that:

At the same time that immigration—especially undocumented immigration—has reached or surpassed historic highs, crime rates have declined, notably in cities with large numbers of undocumented immigrants, including border cities like El Paso and San Diego.

Incarceration rate for native-born men in the 18-39 age group was five times higher than for foreign-born men in the same age group.
Data from the census and other sources show that for every ethnic group, incarceration rates among young men are lowest for immigrants, even those who are least educated and least acculturated.
As the study noted, the fact that many immigrants enter the country illegally is framed by anti-immigration forces as an assault on the "rule of law," thereby reinforcing the false impression that immigration and criminality are linked.

One of the most disturbing findings of the IPC study was that immigrant children and immigrants with many years in the country are more likely to become criminals than first-generation immigrants or those with less than 15 years in the country. In other words, the more acculturated immigrants are the more likely they are to become criminals—although still at lower rates than those for non-immigrants.

Indignant anti-immigration voices dominate internet discussions with their vitriol and misinformation, and even point to false data to bolster their case. The anti-immigrant forces draw, for example, on the "2006 (First Quarter) INS/FBI Statistical Report on Undocumented Immigrants" with its array of alarming statistics about illegal immigrants and crime to make their case that undocumented immigrants not only break the law entering the country but also break the laws, with a proclivity to violent crimes, once they make their own homes here. Statistics from this study circulate on restrictionist websites and routinely appear in blogs and post-article comment sections across the web.

In fact, no such report exists. INS, the agency that supposedly produced the report, ceased to exist in 2003.

But facts don't get in the way of those who are intent on demonizing undocumented immigrants or "illegals" in the vocabulary of the restrictionists. How do groups like CIS explain the gap between their impressions and the real statistics about crime and immigration? CIS asks the same question in a 2001 report: Why is it that studies don't make the immigration-crime connection when "so much other evidence indicates they are responsible for a wave of individual and organized crime?"

Contrary to their prevailing argument that immigrant crime is terrorizing the U.S. general public, CIS argues that immigrant crime is unreported because it stays within the immigrant community as immigrant-on-immigrant crime. Furthermore, police departments tend to avoid enforcing laws when immigrants are involved because police are not the agency charged with enforcing immigration law. As Heather MacDonald argued in a report published by CIS, "In cities where crime from these lawbreakers ["illegal aliens"] is highest, the police cannot use the most obvious tool to apprehend them: their immigration status."

CIS and other restrictionist think tanks argue that given their supposed criminal natures, the best way to solve the crime problem in cities like Los Angeles is to round up the illegal immigrants. "The police should be given the option of reporting and acting on immigration violations, where doing so would contribute to public safety," wrote MacDonald, a scholar at the conservative Manhattan Institute.

Taking off from the findings of studies that immigrant children are more likely to commit crimes than their parents, CIS argues that our society should root out the problem now by deporting the parents of possible future criminals. "On the issue of crime, the biggest impact of immigration is almost certainly yet to come," warns Steve Camarota, director of research at CIS.

The great distance between fact and perception, reality and scenario was all too evident in Iowa and New Hampshire during presidential primaries, where fear of immigrants has made immigration a leading campaign issue, especially among Republicans. To hear the candidates and constituents rail against immigration, one would have thought immigrants were flooding across the U.S.-Mexico border on their way to Iowa and New Hampshire.

Stoked by anti-immigration groups like the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which publishes alarmist state-by-state profiles of the purported negative impacts of immigrants, restrictionist fever has spread throughout the country. Both Iowa and New Hampshire have overwhelmingly white populations with only a small immigrant population. Even according to FAIR's high estimates, the population of undocumented immigrants or "illegals" does not exceed 55,000 in Iowa and 15,000 in New Hampshire.

Certainly, immigration is an issue that merits public discussion and should be part of the electoral debate. But facts, not irrational fear and dread, should inform the national debate about immigration policy.