U.S. EXPORTS MASSIVE CRIME WAVE

The U.S. government calls them criminal aliens, but they are as American as
drive-by shootings and crack cocaine. . Deportees sometimes come back

Many came to the United States as children, often in the arms of men and
women fleeing poverty and war. They went to school here, but usually not
for long. They came of age on city streets from Los Angeles to New York.
Eventually they broke the law.

In 1996, Congress banished them from America for life and directed
immigration agents to hunt them down. The biggest dragnet in U.S. history
is well under way. Already, more than 500,000 have been deported, according
to government figures, and this year they are being banished at a rate of
one every seven minutes to more than 160 countries around the world.

Wreaking Havoc

The culture of drugs and guns many carry back to their native lands is
wreaking havoc in nations that receive them in substantial numbers.

A six-month Associated Press investigation, which included interviews with
more than 300 police, deportees, church leaders, social scientists and
government officials in the U.S. and abroad, found that in some countries,
the resulting crime waves are overwhelming police.

In Jamaica, one out of every 106 males over the age of 15 is now a criminal
deportee from the U.S. Ten thousand strong, most live in the capital city
of Kingston. Jamaican police say they have been involved in hundreds of
murders.

In Guyana, more than 600 criminal deportees have been absorbed by a country
of less than 700,000. Before their arrival, drive-by shootings, car
hijackings, kidnappings and bank robberies were uncommon, said Ronald
Gajraj, the country's Home Affairs minister. Now such crimes are a constant
part of Guyanese life.

In Honduras, according to the latest figures from Interpol, murders
increased from 1,615 in 1995, to 9,241 in 1998, after the first wave of
what is now 7,000 criminal deportees.

No appeal Under the 1996 U.S. law, every noncitizen sentenced to a year or
more in prison is subject to deportation, even if the sentence is
suspended. Deportable crimes can be anything from murder to petty theft.
The law is retroactive, and it eliminated nearly all grounds for appeal.

As many as 250,000 aliens now serving time in U.S. prisons, on probation or
on parole have been marked for deportation, according to the U.S. Bureau of
Justice Statistics. The total number of deportable criminals among the
estimated 11.8 million non-citizens living in the U.S. is unknown.

One in every 11 U.S. residents -- 32.5 million people -- was born abroad.
According to a report by a group that included the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace, the crime rate among immigrants is only half to a
third that of native-born U.S. citizens. But unlike citizens, aliens who
commit crimes can simply be sent home.