Prejudicial and Unreliable: The Role of Police Reports in U.S. Immigration Detention and Deportation Decisions

The U.S. Congress and almost every federal circuit court of appeals have acknowledged the unreliable and prejudicial nature of police reports. Yet, U.S. immigration decision-makers make life-altering decisions often solely based on those reports, thereby undermining due process, showing prejudice against immigrants, and exacerbating racial bias. Prejudicial and Unreliable: The Role of Police Reports in U.S. Immigration Detention and Deportation Decisions by the National Immigrant Justice Center finds that immigration decision-makers, including judges, equate allegations in police reports with the truth, give these allegations substantial weight, use reports from ongoing or dismissed cases, and make negative inferences if reports are not provided. In one of the cases described in the report, after a criminal judge released an immigrant arrested on drug charges, an immigration judge ordered her detained without bond despite strong evidence of community and family ties. The judge basically considered the allegations in the police report to be true and made a negative inference from her refusal to testify about the arrest charges, a constitutional right that she exercised as advised by her counsel. Being in immigration detention, she was unable to appear in her criminal proceedings to dispute the allegations that led to her detention. The report finds that immigration authorities should take immediate action to reduce damages arising from reliance on police reports by, among other steps, creating a presumption of unreliability and a right to refute any police report. (Jasmina Popaja for The Immigrant Learning Center’s Public Education Institute)

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