9:16 am By Maegan La Mala · California| Immigration · Comments Off
9 Dec 2005
On Wednesday the Costa Mesa City Council approved a plan to have police officers enforce immigration laws. The Police department, based on a plan put forward by the Costa Mesa Mayor, Allan Mansoor, will be trained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials over a 3 1/2 week period to enforce immigration laws while conducting their normal duties. So while police technically are not supposed to be looking for undocumented immigrants, they now do have the right to ask about status when suspected of other crimes. If a person is determined to be in the country “illegally”, police will contact immigration officials to begin proceedings that could lead to detention and deportation.
4:35 pm By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Media| Miami · 2 Comments
8 Dec 2005
Details are still sketchy (and probably will never become clear) and the incident is still fresh in our minds. Yesterday, an “American citizen” (for whatever reason, media is obsessed with this detail), a Latino man, was gunned down by federal air marshals at Miami International Airport.
Did he really say he had a bomb? Did authorities truly feel threatened? We’ll probably never know. But this reminds us that our policy in this country is to shoot first and ask questions later, at the expense of the life of someone who could be mentally ill.
1:23 pm By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Cities| Justice| New York City · Comments Off
22 Nov 2005
The 576 Latino and black police officers of the NYPD whose claims were accepted in a landmark racial discrimination case have won, and between them will split the sum of $17 million:
Officers – 576 of them – will get awards ranging from $3,500 to $400,000 from the suit, which the city settled just over a year ago. The victims charged that the Police Department created a hostile work environment for black and Latino cops, especially when it came to disciplinary matters.
“Cops have their own disciplinary system. The penalty for black and Latino cops were disproportionately higher,” said Diane Paolicelli, an attorney with the firm that represented many of the plaintiffs.
Paolicelli said some cops lost pay, others were given bad assignments or even fired in the retaliatory climate.
She said awards, which varied based on the duration and scale of discrimination plaintiffs allegedly endured, will be sent out over the next month.
Yes, folks, racism exists even in fundamentally racist organizations like the police, and even in the “most liberal city in the nation”.
Via / NY Daily News
VivirLatino is a daily publication published by 2 Mujeres Media, dedicated to featuring all the latest politics, culture, entertainment of interest to the diverse and influential Latino and Latina community in the U.S.
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