By: Daniel Nardini
In 2008, a man named Mark Lyttle was imprisoned by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Lyttle, a U.S. citizen, was also mentally disabled. He was mistaken by ICE for being someone else. He had no idea why he was being imprisoned, nor why ICE placed him into deportation proceedings. He had no legal representation at the deportation proceeding, and he certainly could not have defended himself given his mental disability. What is really mind-boggling is that ICE simply did not check up on his citizenship. Before he knew it, Lyttle had been deported to Mexico—a country he was not born or raised in. He wandered around Mexico and parts of Central America for 125 before he went to a U.S. consular office in Mexico City. To his good fortune, a sympathetic consular official actually listened and contacted the U.S. State Department. Meanwhile, Lyttle’s family contacted the U.S. government about where their son was. Eventually they found him in Mexico, and when all of the paperwork was done Lyttle was able to return to America. Ironically, the U.S. government admitted no fault, but paid compensation.
As strange and tragic as this story was, it illustrates one very important point—that the U.S. government does not provide legal representation to U.S. citizens and legal immigrants with mental disabilities. This was changed recently when a U.S. District Court judge for the Central District of California ruled in the case Franco-Gonzalez vs. Holder that all legal immigrants with mental disabilities must be given legal representation regardless (U.S. citizens cannot be arrested and deported by ICE). This is important because legal immigrants with mental disabilities cannot defend themselves, and should not be deprived of their constitutional rights. That U.S. immigration had done this for so long does not justify its actions. It was wrong in the Lyttle case, and in the Jose Antonio Franco-Gonzalez case (the case named after), to just throw these two men into prison because they “looked like the illegal type” and just throw away the key.
What is really tragic is that the U.S. government is far from careful in who it deports. In 2012, the U.S. government deported a record 400,000 people. How many of them were U.S. citizens or legal immigrant residents? No one can say since this information is not tracked by the U.S. government. While the U.S. government must now provide legal representation to those who are mentally disabled, I have to ask how this will be applied in a realistic situation. With U.S. immigration trying to deport record numbers of people, it becomes all too easy for some of them to be totally legal in this country (not to mention being actual U.S. citizens), and yet end up in jail and eventually be deported. Immigration reform, long overdue, is just part of the answer in dealing with this issue. The other is protecting the rights of those accused of being in this country illegally. This issue can and should be dealt with now.
Bringing the Mentally Disabled Out of the ICE Black Hole
By: Daniel Nardini
As strange and tragic as this story was, it illustrates one very important point—that the U.S. government does not provide legal representation to U.S. citizens and legal immigrants with mental disabilities. This was changed recently when a U.S. District Court judge for the Central District of California ruled in the case Franco-Gonzalez vs. Holder that all legal immigrants with mental disabilities must be given legal representation regardless (U.S. citizens cannot be arrested and deported by ICE). This is important because legal immigrants with mental disabilities cannot defend themselves, and should not be deprived of their constitutional rights. That U.S. immigration had done this for so long does not justify its actions. It was wrong in the Lyttle case, and in the Jose Antonio Franco-Gonzalez case (the case named after), to just throw these two men into prison because they “looked like the illegal type” and just throw away the key.
What is really tragic is that the U.S. government is far from careful in who it deports. In 2012, the U.S. government deported a record 400,000 people. How many of them were U.S. citizens or legal immigrant residents? No one can say since this information is not tracked by the U.S. government. While the U.S. government must now provide legal representation to those who are mentally disabled, I have to ask how this will be applied in a realistic situation. With U.S. immigration trying to deport record numbers of people, it becomes all too easy for some of them to be totally legal in this country (not to mention being actual U.S. citizens), and yet end up in jail and eventually be deported. Immigration reform, long overdue, is just part of the answer in dealing with this issue. The other is protecting the rights of those accused of being in this country illegally. This issue can and should be dealt with now.