By Joe Palazzolo
If you’re not in the U.S. legally, can you practice law here?
The highest state courts in California and Florida are considering the question in the cases of two law school graduates who were brought to the U.S. as children.
When Jose Manuel Godinez-Samperio applied to take the bar exam last year, the Florida Board of Bar Examiners granted him a waiver, because he didn’t have proof of his immigration status. He took the test and found out in September that he passed. The bar asked the Florida Supreme Court for an advisory opinion on whether he is eligible for admission.
In California, Sergio C. Garcia was sworn in as a lawyer at a courthouse in Chico late last year, but theCaliforniabar reexamined his case after media inquiries about his immigration status, according to this story in today’s Los Angeles Times. Now, the California Supreme Court must decide whether he should be allowed to have a license to practice law.
Legal experts say the odds are long that the courts will rule in favor of Messrs Godinez-Samperio and Garcia. Federal law prohibits employers fromknowinglyhiring illegal workers, and people in the U.S. illegally are generally barred from receiving federal grants, loans and professional licenses, unless the benefits are approved by individual states.
But federal law doesn’t require those who hire independent contractors to ask for proof of immigration status. Stephen Yale-Loehr, a law professor atCornell Law School, told the Associated Press that a client who pays for services isn’t breaking the law even if the contractor isn’t authorized to work in the U.S.
While the cases play out in California and Florida, Cesar Vargas, a CUNY School of Law graduate who entered the country illegally when he was 5 years old, has opened a legislative lobbying firm, DRM Capitol Group LLC — a nod to the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act, known as the Dream Act, which would provide illegal immigrants who arrived in the U.S. before age 16 with a path to citizenship.
“I found out that I can do this and in a legal way,” Vargas, 28, told the AP. He has recruited several other so-called Dreamers and a U.S. citizen to work with him.
Source: blogs.wsj.com
Small California town shocked by family murder-suicide - Vacaville Reporter
News of Saturday's murder-suicide boomeranged through the area's closely-knit Indian community, which numbers 15,500 in Fresno County, including about 750 in Selma, a town of 23,000 surrounded by vineyards and peach orchards. The majority of Indians in the area are Punjabi Sikhs, like the family.
Authorities have said the former officer, Avtar Singh, shot his wife and two children and gravely wounded a third child early Saturday before turning the gun on himself.
Investigators were still trying to determine a motive.
"Our community is completely shocked," said Rajbir Singh Pannu, president of the town's Sikh temple. "It's a really bad misfortune, especially for the children who died. Anybody who takes somebody's life, in our religion that's cowardice."
It was just more than a year ago that Singh was arrested after his wife said he had choked her.
That set off a process that prompted the Indian government to seek his extradition days later in the 1996 death of a prominent lawyer and human rights activist in Kashmir, a disputed region in the Himalayas.
Singh, who in recent years operated a small trucking business in Selma, bailed
out of jail after last year's arrest. It remained unclear Sunday why he was never extradited.In India, the lawyer and brother of Jalil Andrabi -- the murdered human rights activist -- blamed the Indian government, saying Singh's family would still be alive if officials had tried harder to bring him to justice.
"These lives could have been saved if a trial of Maj. Avtar Singh was conducted on time," said Andrabi's brother, Arshad. "We have lost that chance now. He was a known murderer and we are appalled that he was even shielded in the United States. It's a failure of justice at all levels."
In Selma, community members were also disappointed that police did not send Singh back to India when his warrant came to light, Pannu said.
"They should have taken him then and there, if they had evidence, and not let him kill more people," he said.
Neighbors and Indian community members said they knew little about the husband's military past.
"Not many people knew him. He didn't tell anybody who he is or where he came from," said Harry Gill, president of Punjabi Sahit, a Punjabi organization in the Central Valley. "The family didn't attend any functions. They lived a very low profile life."
News of the murder-suicide reached Gill on Saturday at an Indian wedding attended by about 1,000 people. When Gill asked others about the family, no one knew much about them.
Next door neighbor, Barbara Childers, said the family's three-year-old often rode his bike outside and the wife cooked with her window open. Singh fertilized Childers' lawn a few days ago.
"They were the most wonderful family," she said. "They were helpful neighbors, the sweetest people you have ever met."
On Saturday, Childers said she heard 11 shots. Soon afterward, the neighborhood was evacuated by police.
Singh called police around 6:15 a.m. and told them that he had just killed four people, Fresno County Sheriff's Deputy Chris Curtice said. He added that a sheriff's SWAT team was called in to assist because of Singh's military background and the India charges against him.
When the SWAT team entered the home they found the bodies of Singh, a woman believed to be his wife and two children, ages 3 and 15, Curtice said. All appeared to have died from gunshot wounds.
The 17-year-old suffered severe head trauma. He remained in critical condition on at a Fresno medical center, Curtice said.
On Sunday morning, two dozen classmates of the two older boys -- the 15-year-old was known as Aryan and the 17-year-old was known as Chris -- ran 5 miles from Selma High School to the family's house to remember the boys. They said the two were well-liked and members of the school's ROTC.
"Chris was smart, funny and very motivated. He was very easy to get along with," said 15-year-old Alexis Galindo, his classmate and neighbor.
The boys told her that their father kept several weapons in the house, but they never mentioned any problems at home, she said.
Christopher Cano, another classmate, said he last talked to Chris Friday night at the movie theater.
"He was with his mom and brothers. They looked so happy," he said.
Cano said he texted Chris when he heard about the incident. "I'm still hoping he'll text me back," he said.
The only other Indian family that lives on the same street said they also knew little of the Singhs. Abeda Desai said the family had no relatives in California, but the wife's siblings lived in Canada, while the husband's relatives were still in India.
Selma police last had contact with Singh about two months ago when he called to complain that an Indian reporter wouldn't leave him alone because of the murder warrant.
The human rights lawyer killed in 1996 disappeared at the height of protests in Indian-controlled Kashmir, where nearly a dozen rebel groups have fought security forces for independence or merger with Pakistan since 1989. More than 68,000 people, mostly civilian, have been killed in the uprising and subsequent Indian crackdown.
A police investigation said Andrabi had been picked up from his Srinagar home by Indian troops and killed in their custody. The probe blamed Singh and his soldiers for that killing and also accused Singh of involvement in the killings of six other Kashmiri men.
Singh had been charged in Kashmir only with Andrabi's killing. But Kashmir police had also sought permission from the government of India for Singh's prosecution in the six other killings.
Under India's armed forces special powers act, federal permission has to be obtained before police can prosecute any army or paramilitary soldier posted in Kashmir.
At the temple in Selma on Sunday, women in flowing tunics and pants, colorful shawls draped over their heads, kneeled on the right of the hall and men in turbans and scarves on the left while community leaders read prayers for the family during the Sunday service.
Temple leaders said the community would collect money, so those killed could be cremated, which is the usual method for disposal of remains in Sikhism.
Neighbors and classmates also planned to hold a vigil for the family Sunday evening.
Source: www.thereporter.com
California official resigns after stepson abuse video - KMOV
EL CENTRO, Calif. (AP) -- A California water agency director has resigned his elected office several days after a neighbor posted online video that shows the official apparently hitting his stepson with a belt for dropping a baseball during a game of backyard catch.
The neighbor turned in the video to sheriff's investigators last week, and Anthony Sanchez was arrested on Friday on suspicion of felony child abuse.
The Imperial Valley Press reports (http://bit.ly/KtQ34Q) that Sanchez's lawyer said Saturday that Sanchez has quit his post with the Imperial Irrigation District that oversees water and electricity supply and distribution in the Imperial and Coachella valleys.
Ryan Childers says no charges have been filed against his client and the facts of the case will emerge during the sheriff's inquiry.
Sanchez was elected to the board in 2006 to represent Calexico and other cities.
------
Information from: Imperial Valley Press, http://www.ivpressonline.com
Source: www.kmov.com
California deficit drives shift in state's welfare philosophy - Los Angeles Daily News
LOS ANGELES - Pressured by a $16 billion budget deficit, Gov. Jerry Brown is proposing a major overhaul of the state's welfare-to-work program with the strategy of slashing people's benefits to motivate them to get jobs faster.
The move, if approved by the state Legislature as part of the 2012-13 budget package, would save $880 million, but beyond the savings, analysts say it represents a shift in the philosophy of how the Golden State helps its neediest residents.
"It's a reversal of the state's historic commitment to these families and children," said Scott Graves, senior policy analyst with the California Budget Project. "It's a very significant change."
California is the national leader in welfare recipients. About 3.8 percent of state residents were on welfare in 2010, the highest percentage in the country. In fact, California houses about a third of the nation's welfare recipients, while only housing one-eighth of the national population.
Most of the recipients, however, are children - more than three-quarters of the 1.5 million in the welfare-to-work program CalWORKs, which stands for California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids. The rest are mostly single mothers who must work or participate in job training and related activities to receive cash assistance.
The state has traditionally held a relatively generous attitude toward welfare. For instance, CalWORKs gives cash grants to children even when their
parents are ineligible for benefits for various reasons, such as being illegal immigrants, receiving disability, or failing to abide by the program's rules. Only three other states - Indiana, Oregon and Arizona - have such an expansive policy.California also allows parents to receive job services and cash grants for up to four years. Before last year, the limit was 60 months.
The policies have made the program an expensive budget line - the state spends $2.9 billion on CalWORKs and related programs - and an easy target for lawmakers looking for costs to trim with little political fallout. In years past, lawmakers have proposed doing away with benefits to children with ineligible parents and even slashing the whole CalWORKs program.
The state's budget woes have given renewed impetus to whittle away at CalWORKs. Last year, the maximum five-year benefit period shrunk to four years and monthly grants were diminished 8 percent. A family of three currently receives $638 a month, less than the rate in 1988.
For the next fiscal year, the governor is proposing more sweeping cutbacks, including a 27 percent cut in cash assistance to children with ineligible parents and further slashing the time limit for full benefits from four years to two years.
Other rule changes would restrict benefits to mothers of younger children and families earning poverty-level wages and increase sanctions on those who violate program terms.
"We felt the program was losing its focus of welfare-to-work," said Todd Bland, deputy director the state Department of Social Services' welfare-to-work division. "The reason we wanted to refocus is because of the very difficult budget environment."
The changes also come at a time when California is appealing federal penalties of $160 million because it failed to move enough welfare recipients to private sector jobs of at least 30 hours a week in 2008 and 2009, a requirement to receive federal money that helps pay for CalWORKs. Many California recipients are given part-time, publicly subsidized jobs so they get work experience.
CalWORKs recipients say getting a regular job that pays enough to support a family is not easy as lawmakers think.
Sarah Smith, a 31-year-old divorced mother of four in Los Angeles County, had been a stay-at-home mother since the age of 18, only working sporadically between having children. She was forced to turn to CalWORKs a year ago after her husband stopped paying child support. She received $850 a month in cash aid and $700 in food stamps.
She's also been able to make herself more marketable through the job services the program offers. She's beefed up her clerical skills, self-confidence and resume with a minimum-wage, temporary job as a customer service assistant with the county Department of Social Services, but the job ends this month.
She's hoping she now will be able to find a permanent job. If not, she will try for a subsidized job program where the county pays half her salary and the private employer pays the rest.
Policymakers don't realize that people need a chance to rebuild their lives, Smith said, adding that CalWORKs aid is far from enough to live on.
"It's still a juggling act," she said. "People are trying to get jobs. No one really wants to be on welfare. Most people are trying to get off it."
Nearly half of CalWORKs families move off the program within two years, but about 18 percent are long-term. Those families are often have very young children and headed by parents who lack a high school diploma or job skills, or have a family member with a disability, according to a report by the Public Policy Institute of California.
Brown's reforms aim to get parents off welfare before they become entrenched. The plan calls for parents to be hired or employable within two years of entering the program by providing job training and counseling, mental health, substance abuse and domestic violence support services, and child care. They must either work or participate in those activities to get the cash aid.
After two years, the services and some money would be cut off if they do not find a private sector job - a move that would affect about 130,000 parents, according to the state Legislative Analyst's Office.
Those parents could still receive a much-reduced cash benefit for child maintenance. A parent with two children would receive $375 a month, a drop of $263.
If parents do find employment, they could still be eligible to receive services such as child care for another two years and some cash aid if their income remains below a certain level.
Social service providers say it's overly optimistic to expect the private sector to absorb tens of thousands of people, many with minimal job skills, with California's unemployment rate the second highest in the nation at 10.9 percent in April. Only 11 percent of CalWORKs parents had private sector jobs of at least 30 hours week in 2009, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.
"CalWORKs recipients are living on a shoestring as it is," said Frank Mecca, executive director of the County Welfare Directors Association of California. "This is going to plunge many children into poverty and likely increase homelessness. You're shredding the safety net at a time when it's needed most."
Republicans say it's about time California pushed harder to get people to self-sufficiency, and say more is needed. Halving the time limit is a good move, but continuing to give parents cash for children with no strings attached defeats the purpose of welfare-to-work.
"It removes the responsibility from the parent. You're taking away the accountability from the oversight of the program," said Assemblyman Brian Jones, R-Santee, vice chairman of the Assembly Human Services Committee.
Instead of focusing on half measures of welfare reform, the governor should concentrate on job-stimulation strategies so people have a place to go, he said. "If there's no regulatory reform, he's wasting his time," Jones said.
The debate over CalWORKs' mission is likely to continue, especially if state revenues continue to fall short, said Caroline Danielson, policy fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California.
"The interest is in reorienting the program toward work," she said.
Source: www.dailynews.com
No comments:
Post a Comment