Immigration Law Training For Jail Workers Advances

A controversial proposal to train Manassas police officers to enforce some federal immigration laws was amended yesterday, with the City Council recommending that regional jail staffers undertake that duty instead.

The vote cooled a tense dispute between the city's police chief, John J. Skinner, and council member Jackson H. Miller, the Republican candidate for the 50th District seat in the House of Delegates, who is running on an anti-illegal immigration platform.

"The idea is to use the entire region's economy of scale," Miller said of the compromise proposal, which he said he worked out over the weekend with Vice Mayor Harry J. "Hal" Parrish II (R). "If the City of Manassas were the only one to move forward, it would not have the same impact."

Miller, who is also a Prince William County police officer, wanted Manassas to join Herndon and a growing number of jurisdictions across the country participating in the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) program to give state and local police the power to initiate deportation proceedings for illegal immigrants who have criminal records.

But Miller faced staunch opposition from Skinner, and the two clashed during a work session last week. Skinner said the program would create an undue burden for his police force, which he considers short-staffed, in addition to marring its fragile relations with the city's growing Latino community.

"Undocumented and illegal aliens have a certain level of fear of federal immigration agents," Skinner said in an interview before last night's meeting. "If they're afraid of us . . . then we could erode the trust and confidence we have with that minority community today."

The ICE program, Section 287 (g), allows local police to set the terms of their cooperation with the federal agency, then receive training in immigration enforcement. Officers are then able to detain and process illegal immigrant offenders before delivering them to federal authorities, streamlining the deportation process.

But because suspects caught in Manassas, Manassas Park and Prince William are processed through the county Adult Detention Center, top police officials from the three jurisdictions resisted the proposal to train the officers and urged training for jail staff instead.

Jail Superintendent Charles "Skip" Land said he wasn't sure whether his crowded facility is prepared for such a mandate. "I have not, at this point, gathered all the information that I need to look at," he said.

Completing the paperwork to process an immigrant offender can take hours, potentially straining jail staff. Land said he plans to investigate how the program would affect the center, then present his findings to the jail board next month.

Under the motion approved by the Manassas City Council, if other local agencies don't agree to the ICE proposal for jail staff in the next 90 days, the city will reconsider seeking the training for its police force.

Council members emphasized that the measure would not affect law-abiding illegal immigrants. "We need to be clear this is not a massive round-up of people who are here illegally," council member Marc T. Aveni (R) said.

Staff writer Theresa Vargas contributed to this report.