Just 37 Percent Facing Deportation Have Lawyers

Dave Stafford for www.theindianalawyer.com

Fewer than four in 10 people facing deportation proceedings in the United States are represented by legal counsel. Among the majority of those immigrants who are in government detention, just 14 percent had lawyers, according to a new study.

The American Immigration Council report released Wednesday found only 37 percent of all immigrants had legal representation in removal cases. The report recommends creation of a government-funded public defender system that could pay for itself by reducing the taxpayer costs of detaining immigrants for years on end as they await removal proceedings.

Among the report’s findings:

• Mexican nationals were least likely to be represented in deportation cases, with just 21 percent having lawyers in cases decided between 2007 and 2012. Conversely, Chinese nationals were represented 92 percent of the time.
• People from Mexico facing removal proceedings were detained 78 percent of the time, compared with people from China, who were detained just 4 percent of the time.
• Detained immigrants who had lawyers were more than twice as likely to receive a custody hearing. Those represented by attorneys at custody hearings were four times likelier to be released afterward.
• Immigrants who were never detained were granted relief in 63 percent of immigration cases where lawyers represented them compared with 13 percent where the immigrant was unrepresented.

“In short, at every stage in immigration court proceedings, representation was associated with considerably more successful case outcomes,” the report says.

The study said the government spends $2 billion annually on detention of immigrants awaiting removal proceedings. “More than half of immigrants facing removal in immigration court during the six-year period covered in this report (2007-2012) spent their entire case in government custody — almost 56 percent of immigrants were ‘detained’ in prisons, jails, and detention centers across the country as they awaited the decision of an immigration judge,” the report says.

“These data thus support other research concluding that a government-funded public defender system for immigrants could potentially pay for itself by helping to reduce court and detention costs associated with having immigrants pursue their immigration cases without the advice of counsel.”

COA Rejects Ex-Teacher’s Appeal For Lighter Sentence For Seduction Of StudentOlivia Covington for www.theindianalawyer.com

A former Indiana teacher and coach convicted of child seduction with a student cannot have his sentence reduced after the Indiana Court of Appeals decided Wednesday that his character and the nature of his offense do not warrant a lighter sentence.

In the case of Jakob Robinson v. State of Indiana, 79A02-1603-CR-522, Jakob Robinson, a former teacher and coach at McCutcheon High School in Tippecanoe County, pleaded guilty to five counts of Level 5 felony child seduction in September 2015.

Robinson’s plea came after K.F., his student, informed the Tippecanoe County Sheriff’s Department that she had a sexual relationship with Robinson. K.F. reported that between October 2014 and January 2015, Robinson engaged her in numerous sexual encounters both during and after school hours, bought her clothing and jewelry, met with her in public in the presence of his two minor daughters and confided in her about the problems in his marriage.

After his plea, the Tippecanoe Superior Court sentenced Robinson to eight years, with five years executed and three years suspended to probation.

The former teacher appealed his sentence, saying it was inappropriate in light of the nature of the offenses and his character. All of the offenses he was convicted of occurred with the same student in a short period of time, Robinson said, so his sentence should have been lighter.

Further, Robinson argued that the trial court improperly considered his position of trust with K.F. as an aggravator because the facts related to his position over K.F. “did not exceed that necessary to prove an element of the offense of child seduction.”

But in its Wednesday opinion, the Court of Appeals wrote that it easily rejected Robinson’s arguments.

“The fact that Robinson, over several months, repeatedly victimized a minor who trusted him does not mitigate his sentence,” the court wrote. “And Robinson’s suggestion that his obvious position of trust over K.F. was nothing more than that necessary to establish an element of the offense of child seduction is not supported by cogent reasoning.”

The appellate court also wrote that Robinson’s character did not warrant a lighter sentence, saying instead that his guilty plea, his lack of criminal history and his support within the community were the reasons he only received an eight-year sentence when the maximum sentence was 30 years.