Ethnicity and race
Jeffrey Poland
12/9/20
Ethnicity/ Immigration and crime
The subject I chose to talk about today was the correlation of ethnicity and crime in America today. The specific thing I chose to talk about was immigration and crime and how they are treated going through the criminal justice system and through trial. It is always hard with the immigrants or the undocumented immigrants because they could always feel like they do not have the same rights as a citizen. Or the authority on sight makes it seem like they have to respond.
One of the first things the lady talked about was how the immigrants were treated during arrest when the officer was speaking to them. “The immigrant may feel as though they might not have the same rights as a regular citizen” (lady speaker). Especially if they are not great at speaking English or something they may feel as though they may not have the same rights as a regular citizen of America. This may lead to them trying to talk their way out of the crime when what they should be doing is keep quiet until their defense attorney gets there and is able to defend them the proper way in court or in a deal. But the immigrant does not know of these rights because he has never been properly informed of his rights since he is a new citizen and may not know all the things that are allowed and not allowed by law enforcement. This can be related to class because we talk about people even in this country that have lived here their whole lives do not even know of the rights they have when arrested. Especially if they are in lower-level poverty or from an area with high crime rates and more of a minority base population. The police want them to be less educated so that they have an easier time of convicting them in court because that is all that their job consists of is arresting and trying to get them prosecuted for what they have done.
The next thing that they have to go through is the actual court room process and they entire law and sentencing takes place. The lady speaker which podcasts I listened for this is a defense attorney of the law. She has represented immigrants in the past and she said an ongoing theme for all of them was that “they just wanted it to go away as quickly as possible” (lady speaker). She said this was the biggest reason and motive was that they just asked the quickest way for them to be able to have the whole process be done with and be able to go back to work or whatever they have going on. The lady tried to explain that a few days in jail could impact their living here for the rest of their life. So she always urged them to fight it in court and possibly win instead of plea deals and basically be banished from this country for something small like a misdemeanor. I relate this to the book I read for class call Down out and under arrest. These people in skid row did something that changed their lives and were almost exiled out of the main part of the city into skid row and they stayed there and continued to do illegal things.
People in the country that are trying to come here and make a new life should be able to and be able to have some slack cut for them. There should be improvements in the system for immigrants and matter for all people that are minorities they all need the help they need. They should have classes in places where immigrants and people are able to go to learn all the rights that they have as new citizens of the U.S. How would they be able to know of all the rights that go along with the law if they are new to the country and do not even know the customs or even speak fluently in the language? Another improvement that could be made could be the treatment of police towards the immigrant that is being arrested. They might be scared or not know what is going on because they have never experienced this from their home country and now they are being thrown in the back of a random car they do not know of. It could be a scary thing to experience.
There are many issues with immigration/ ethnicity in this country that need to be fixed. It goes from the non-education of rights to them as they become citizens. Then the harsh trial where they get a bad plea deal and are banished from this country. If we just put some effort into reform it could improve immigrant and crime significantly.
Word Cited
Edelman, P. B. (2017) Not a Crime to be poor. The criminalization of poverty in America. The New Press.
Davis, A. J. (2018) Policing the Black Man: arrest, prosecution, and imprisonment.
Podcast link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pW5HgslDJQw