COURT RULES ON IMMIGRANTS HELD IN PRISONS

SAN FRANCISCO, (AP) April 10 -- Hundreds of illegal immigrants in nine Western
states who have completed prison terms for crimes in this country must
be freed until the United States can persuade their homelands to take
them back, a federal appeals court ruled today.

In a 3-to-0 ruling, a panel of the United States Court of Appeals for
the Ninth Circuit rejected the argument of immigration officials that
federal law authorized an indefinite, potentially lifelong, jailing of
illegal immigrants whose native countries have no repatriation
agreement with the United States.

The ruling will probably be appealed, said Bill Strassberger, a
spokesman for the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

The court said the immigrants must be released 90 days after a final
deportation order and allowed to remain free under I.N.S. supervision
until their home country reached an agreement with the United States
to accept deportees.

A 1996 federal law required deportation of noncitizens who committed a
range of felonies, including most drug crimes.

The law said immigrants whose home countries refused to accept them
"may be detained beyond the removal period."

The I.N.S. contended that the law allowed indefinite detention of
immigrants it considered dangerous, but the court disagreed.

The ruling applies to immigrants from Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos, none
of which has a repatriation agreement with the United States. It also
covers some Cubans and some immigrants from the former Soviet Union.

The government estimates that 400 to 500 immigrants will be affected
in the nine states covered by the Ninth Circuit. The I.N.S. said a
year ago that there were 3,500 such prisoners nationwide.