Immigration Prosecutions Clog Federal Courts

The number of immigration prosecutions -- both felony and misdemeanor -- has jumped 40% since 2000, clogging the federal courts in the southwestern borderland to the extent that prosecution for other crimes -- white-collar to drug and gun smuggling -- has dropped drastically. It's all part of the war on terrorism! But the sentences are only for a few months and done en mass -- up to 200 a secession. The practice of voluntary departure has given way to plea-bargaining. Meanwhile gun-smuggling from the US across the border has grown precipitously to fuel the drug-wars in Northern Mexico.. (See New York Times article.)