News > Immigration In Minnesota
Defending Immigrants in Hennepin County
Posted on Dec 07 2017
“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney, and to have an attorney present during any questioning. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to represent you.”
If you are charged with shoplifting a carton of cigarettes, you have a right to remain silent and a right to an attorney. Your maximum sentence is 90 days in jail and a fine of up to $1000. Your likely sentence is much, much less – probably no jail time at all. Nonetheless, you have a constitutional right to an attorney and, if you cannot afford an attorney, to having an attorney appointed to represent you.
If you are charged with entering the United States without permission, you are likely to lose your home, your job, and your family, and to be deported and barred from returning for at least 10 years. If you cannot afford an attorney, you are out of luck – you have no constitutional right to a public defender.
On December 6, by a 4-3 vote, Hennepin County Commissioners said that immigrants will have a right to a public defender in deportation cases in Hennepin County.
Criminal court rules and procedures are complicated. Immigration court rules and procedures are exponentially more complicated. As MPR reported :
“Those without legal representation are less likely to fight their cases and more likely to be deported. Only about 14 percent of undocumented immigrants have representation, according to immigration lawyers.”
Hennepin County is taking a stand for immigrants. The budget amendment, introduced by Commissioner Marion Green and passed by the County Commissioners, will provide representation to immigrants who are facing deportation and cannot afford to pay an attorney.
That’s a big step forward in helping immigrants make their cases in deportation proceedings. The second big step is an order that immigrants being booked into Hennepin County jail be told of their right to refuse to talk to immigration officers — their right to remain silent, their right not to get on the phone with ICE.
“We have overwhelming anecdotal evidence that residents aren’t given this information,” [Greene] said. “And are often kind of immediately, at a very vulnerable moment in the process, put on the phone with an ICE agent or made to go talk to an ICE agent in a room that they have at (the) county jail.”
Sheriff Rich Stanek coordinates with ICE in many ways, including the jail policy of putting any immigrants on the phone with ICE as they are processed into the jail. The County Commissioners can’t order the sheriff not to do that. They did vote to require that immigrants be told of their right to refuse to talk to ICE and that they get access to attorneys. Those are two big steps toward a higher standard of justice for immigrant defendants in Hennepin County.