Is prosecutorial discretion a valid excuse for ignoring the law?

[Hawkmoon]

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-deportations-exclusiv-idUSKBN1902I4

[Illegal] Immigration advocates are upset that the Trump administration seems to be unclosing the cases of some illegal aliens who were effectively given amnesty under the rules of the Obama administration. Personally, I don't have a problem with enforcing the law. So the lead guy in the article is a house painter. Every house he paints is a house that is NOT painted by a house painter who is either a citizen, or a legal resident. Yes, it's sad that he now has a child who is a citizen, but actions have consequences. Nobody made him come here illegally. Nobody made him procreate while here illegally.

In Velasquez's case, for example, he was cited for driving without a license in Tennessee, where illegal immigrants cannot get licenses, he said.

"I respect the law and just dedicate myself to my work," he said. "I don't understand why this is happening."

Massive logical disconnect. "I respect the law -- when it's convenient for me. But I don't respect it enough to wait until I can get a visa to work in the U.S., and I don't respect it enough to not drive without a driver's license."

Maybe a few more deportations will encourage more illegal aliens to self-deport.

[RoadKingLarry]

As far as driving with out a valid license goes, it is far too damn common.
I fully support confiscation of the vehicle for someone that is knowingly driving on a suspended/revoked license, same for no insurance.

[lupinus]

Which means he's also driving without insurance. So when he gets into an accident where he's at fault, regardless of wrong doing or oops *expletive deleted*it happens, someone's car either isn't getting repaired or they're out of pocket for their deductible if they have coverage for it.

It likewise means the same with his house painting, it's not insured or bonded or anything. Or taxed like the rest of us would be.

So all you want about having a child now or whatever, but you know what lots of folks who break the law and have to accept the consequences have kids. I'll even agree our immigration system is broken and needs changes. Tax code even more so, which would at least remove the tax issues with him being here and working illegally. But tough *expletive deleted*it, cause there are plenty you others that are playing by the rules whose lives are that much harder for it.

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

[230RN]

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

Somebody ought to go out there in New York Harbor and officially delete those words from the Statue of Liberty.

Enough of the wretched refuse!

This country has broad shoulders and can certainly carry a proper load, but the indiscriminate open door attitude of some of our hyperleftists will ruin it.

Of course, that's the leftists' long-term strategy.  To break the back of the United States of America.

Terry, 230RN

REF:
http://www.libertystatepark.com/emma.htm

[Scout26]

The difference was the wretched refuse went through Ellis Island, went to work, and embraced being Americans.  They weren't looking for a handout, or to change their new home, they wanted to change themselves to their new homeland.

And as far as having kids here.   I'm fine with them being American citizens, but that doesn't mean their parents have to stay here.  When I was in Germany, children born to American servicemembers were German citizens.  That didn't mean that they and their parents could automagically stay in Germany. (But they were still subject to Germany's compulsory service when they turned 18, unless they renounced their citizenship.)

They also weren't automatically US citizens, their parents had to fill out paperwork and send it to the US Embassy in Bonn. Which would take anywhere from weeks to months.

So I have no problems deporting the parents, the children can either join their parents and come back when they are 18, or they can be left behind with legal family members, relatives, or others.

[T.O.M.]

Back to the OP question, the idea of prosecutorial discretion was to give a prosecutor the option for doing the right thing, regardless of the law.  An example from my time as a prosecutor...mom walked into her house to find her boyfriend engaging in a sex act with her 12 year old daughter. She went to the kitchen, got a frying pan, and snuck u behind the guy.  Smqched him in the head 2 or 3 times.  He was arrested for Rape.  He and his famiky insisted that ploice take a report on her for assault with a deadly weapon.   Sex charge went to the sex crime team.  I caught the assault case.  My opinion?  Mom's mistake was using an aluminum frying pan,  not cast iron.  Law says she was guilty and should have been charged (at the time, deadly force in defense of others didnt apply to rape).  I refused the case.  It was the right thing.  As for what's happening at te national level with immigration, that's a disaster of issues unrelated to proseutorial discretion.

[Hawkmoon]

I'm sure the liberals would say that declining to separate families is "the right thing." That ignores the reality that the family could take the kid(s) with them. But we've created a monster by ignoring this issue for so long. If a kid goes with his deported parents at a young age, he/she adapts to the native country and that's not a problem. When it becomes a problem is when the kids live here for ten, twelve, fifteen years and THEN the parents come up for deportation. By then, the kids are culturally more American (sort of) than their parents' culture, the kids may even speak English better than the parents' native language (the kids may not even speak Spanish at all), so deporting the parents leaves the kids in limbo. Stay here, and they have no parents. Go with the parents, and they're fish out of water.

But ... that's their problem, not my problem. We are either a nation of laws, or we're not. That's what the liberals don't seem to comprehend. The sooner we start enforcing immigration law, the sooner we stop kicking the can down the road and creating more families who will face the same dilemma.

[RoadKingLarry]

My solution to the "separating families" BS:
Two choices.
1- Take the juvenile US citizen (AKA -anchor baby) home with you and when they turn 18 they will be able to enter the US as they wish.
2- The juvenile US citizen (AKA -anchor baby) can be placed in foster care until they are 18 then do as they wish.

Either way the illegal immigrant is returned to their country of origin.

[Hawkmoon]

My solution to the "separating families" BS:
Two choices.
1- Take the juvenile US citizen (AKA -anchor baby) home with you and when they turn 18 they will be able to enter the US as they wish.
2- The juvenile US citizen (AKA -anchor baby) can be placed in foster care until they are 18 then do as they wish.

Either way the illegal immigrant is returned to their country of origin.

De acuerdo, señor

[T.O.M.]

My solution to the "separating families" BS:
Two choices.
1- Take the juvenile US citizen (AKA -anchor baby) home with you and when they turn 18 they will be able to enter the US as they wish.
2- The juvenile US citizen (AKA -anchor baby) can be placed in foster care until they are 18 then do as they wish.

Either way the illegal immigrant is returned to their country of origin.

Oh for the love of all that is good and holy, please not the foster care system.  It is truly overwhelmed with the kids we're taking away from the drug addicts.  No mas.

[Hawkmoon]

Well, Janet Reno sent that Cuban kid back to Cuba to keep the family together, so why should these families be any different?

(Yes, I know -- because the kids are American citizens. But if public policy is to keep families together, then the kids go where the parents go, not the other way 'round.)

[Perd Hapley]

An example from my time as a prosecutor...mom walked into her house to find her boyfriend engaging in a sex act with her 12 year old daughter. She went to the kitchen, got a frying pan, and snuck u behind the guy.  Smqched him in the head 2 or 3 times.  He was arrested for Rape.  He and his famiky insisted that ploice take a report on her for assault with a deadly weapon.   Sex charge went to the sex crime team.  I caught the assault case.  My opinion?  Mom's mistake was using an aluminum frying pan,  not cast iron.  Law says she was guilty and should have been charged (at the time, deadly force in defense of others didnt apply to rape).  I refused the case.  It was the right thing. 

Well played.

[Scout26]

Oh for the love of all that is good and holy, please not the foster care system.  It is truly overwhelmed with the kids we're taking away from the drug addicts.  No mas.

^^^ This.  In Spades. The kid either goes back with the parents to their country, or to legal family here.  Not into any type foster or to fictive kin. 

[RevDisk]

Back to the OP question, the idea of prosecutorial discretion was to give a prosecutor the option for doing the right thing, regardless of the law.  An example from my time as a prosecutor...mom walked into her house to find her boyfriend engaging in a sex act with her 12 year old daughter. She went to the kitchen, got a frying pan, and snuck u behind the guy.  Smqched him in the head 2 or 3 times.  He was arrested for Rape.  He and his famiky insisted that ploice take a report on her for assault with a deadly weapon.   Sex charge went to the sex crime team.  I caught the assault case.  My opinion?  Mom's mistake was using an aluminum frying pan,  not cast iron.  Law says she was guilty and should have been charged (at the time, deadly force in defense of others didnt apply to rape).  I refused the case.  It was the right thing.  As for what's happening at te national level with immigration, that's a disaster of issues unrelated to proseutorial discretion.

...

Well, if nothing else, it can serve as an obvious example of that law can be ethically, morally and legally wrong. Like the Dred Scott or Kelo v. City of New London.

[T.O.M.]

...

Well, if nothing else, it can serve as an obvious example of that law can be ethically, morally and legally wrong. Like the Dred Scott or Kelo v. City of New London.

Amen.