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Posted by: kwflatbed

Advocacy groups teach immigrants to protect selves



Joel Rodriguez, an organizer with the Alliance to Develop Power, listened to the concerns of immigrants at a meeting in Springfield last week and discussed their rights. (NANCY PALMIERI FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE)


By Maria Sacchetti, Globe Staff | September 6, 2007

In living rooms, laundromats, and community centers across Massachusetts, immigrant-rights groups are running an underground campaign to teach illegal immigrants to protect themselves from federal agents. Their instructions to the immigrants: Keep their lips sealed and doors shut unless authorities have a warrant.
The grass-roots training sessions, coming in response to recent federal raids through immigrant enclaves from Nantucket to Boston to Springfield, have ignited controversy on all sides.
Federal customs officials criticize the nonprofit groups for aiding anyone in this country illegally and say that agents generally target criminals. But the advocacy groups, worried that the raids are more widespread, say that even illegal immigrants have rights under the Constitution.
"We understand trying to remove violent people," said Maria Elena Letona, executive director of Centro Presente, a Cambridge-based nonprofit that aids immigrants. "But in doing so, you end up terrorizing entire communities."
One steamy night last week in Springfield, a handful of immigrants here illegally from Mexico and Honduras gathered in the sparse kitchen of a tiny apartment. They sat on nylon folding chairs facing a laptop computer that Joel Rodriguez, a trainer for the Alliance to Develop Power, had placed at the edge of the sink.
Their faces tense, they watched a DVD in Spanish that simulated encounters between immigrants and federal officials and police. In one scene, two men wearing jackets emblazoned with "police" and "ICE" pounded on the door, shattering a couple's morning coffee.
The couple froze. Through the closed door, the father asked to see the warrant, which the agent slipped underneath the door. After reading the warrant, the father returned it, saying it did not list his name. Rebuffed, the agents left.
After the video, Rodriguez told the immigrants that they should not lie or carry false documents, or run away.
"The best thing you can do is stay silent," or ask for a lawyer, he said.

Full Story: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/ar...ing_on_rights/

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Posted by: justanotherparatrooper

Their faces tense, they watched a DVD in Spanish that simulated encounters between immigrants and federal officials and police. In one scene, two men wearing jackets emblazoned with "police" and "ICE" pounded on the door, shattering a couple's morning coffee.
The couple froze. Through the closed door, the father asked to see the warrant, which the agent slipped underneath the door. After reading the warrant, the father returned it, saying it did not list his name. Rebuffed, the agents left.
First...what are the odds the guy could read English on the warrant (or are those all multilingual now too?)
Second, Im thinkin the second he slipped that warrant under the door and said no that that door would be on top of him
Third , isnt what these "groups" are doing illegal? aiding and abetting?

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