N. Dakota jails Marshall Islander in visa mix-up

[Babette]

http://www.mvariety.com/pacific/pac01.htm

MAJURO — A Marshall Islander was wrongly jailed for more than six months in the United States mainland in an immigration mixup, but has yet to be officially released from custody.
The ordeal of Jimmy Mote, a 33-year-old Marshall Islander, happened as a result of state-level officials who apparently did not know the visa-free entry status accorded to all Marshall Islands citizens by the Compact of Free Association between this central Pacific nation and the U.S. government.
Mote said North Dakota state policemen sent to arrest him last December told him, “You look like a terrorist.”




Yet another example of abuse of rights... Think the poor guy will get any kind of apology?

[truthspeaker]

1. and he's still in custody?!

Outrageous. Also further evidence that most American citizens are unaware of the extent of our overseas territories and protectorates.

[Ruby Romaine]

2. Unbelievable!

I've heard people have to say "New Mexico USA" or airline employees think it's not in the USA!

[dethl]

6. Yup, us New Mexicans have to...

There are people who still think we're part of Mexico. The ignorance these days.... :(

[KamaAina]

9. Then there was the time one of Mom's clients

at an immigration law firm ran around like a chicken with his head cut off, trying to get a visa for an upcoming vacation.

To Hawai'i.

Poor guy didn't realize that (from an immigration standpoint) it's as easy to travel to the 50th State as it is from New York to New Jersey.
:dunce:

[Babette]

10. I had a friend in Hawaii

who had an international driver's license. On the license it said "valid in the USA, Canada, New Zealand... etc". He got into big trouble with a cop during a traffic stop. The cop insisted the license was no good and tried to haul the guy in for driving without a valid license. The problem was the card didn't specifically say it was good in Hawaii, even though it was good in the USA.

[tkulesa]

3. "You look like a terrorist"

This article PISSES me off!

Petty, pissy little 'patriots' presume to know who's a terrorist and this is the result. Innocent people get locked up, loose everything they have, and even after this guy was let out of jail they are still treating him like a criminal making him wear a locaiton monitor on his ankle.

What the f*ck is the Judge waiting for? What is he thinking?

And how soon is that @#$%! beaurocrat who started this going to get fired?

Enough already. Why the Hell can't people stop harrassing anyone who looks different? Is that really so difficult?

[THUNDER HANDS]

4. yes it is difficult

and it all stems from the packaging of their middle eastern jewish deity as a blonde-haired, blue eyed surfer dude.

If Jesus was portrayed as the brown-skinned middle eastern he was, then I believe most Americans would be a lot more tolerant of people who weren't "American looking."

[oasis]

7. A"brown-skinned middle eastern" image would be a hard sell to would-be

Christians during Europe's dark ages. The church would not have flourished as it has over the last 1500 years. IMHO.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. This is truly astounding

This is way beyond some dumb cop harrassing him. They locked him up for 6 months without bothering to look up the law? Anyone concerned with the case should be sacked for incompetence, or jailed for kidnapping.

[tkulesa]

8. The Only silver lining

is that if he's allowed to sue he's probably going to be set for life over this.

I say IF because I would not be at all surprised if judges tend to dismiss cases like that out-of-hand to protect our dear, innocent government officials.

[AirAmFan]

11. Mote's lawyer should be disbarred. It took a former Peace Corps

volunteer to get the Marshall Is. government involved. How incompetent can an "immigration lawyer" be?

[struggle4progress]

12. Jimmy Mote Case, Part II: Embassy Works to Get Mote Released

Jimmy Mote is still not a free man, despite documentation from United States and Marshall Islands officials verifying his status as a legal non-immigrant. When he was first arrested seven months ago, Mote's first line of defense would have been his nation's embassy. Unfortunately, the Republic of the Marshall Islands Embassy was not in the picture until last week.

According to Mote, both he and his wife tried to contact the Embassy, but with no success. Mote said he also told his immigration attorney to contact the Washington, D.C. office. RMI Embassy's First Secretary, Jessica Reimers, said that the first word of Jimmy Mote’s case reached them at 12:30am on July 27 when his American mother-in-law, called to inform the Embassy that Mote had been imprisoned since last December for immigration reasons.
<snip>

"Our main goal right now is to get Mr. Mote back to North Dakota so that he can reunite with his family," she said.

by Aenet Rowa, Yokwe Online, August 3, 2004
http://www.yokwe.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=863&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0


Immigration Fiasco Puts Marshall Islander in Jail

A Marshallese man was recently released on home-monitoring following seven months of detention at a Minnesota lock-up. He is waiting for the Court to make a decision on whether or not he will be released from custody. He was arrested and detained in error.

Jimmy Mote, a thirty-three old from Majuro, Marshall Islands, came to the United States legally twelve years ago with non-immigrant status, but when he went to apply for an ID card renewal, he was detained by police. Someone working in the government office there found some information on the computer, which has since been proved an error, and had him arrested. According to Mr. Mote, a policeman told him that he looked like a terrorist. " No one seemed to know where the Marshall Islands is," he said.
<snip>

One day, December 2003, Jimmy went to Bismarck, North Dakota to renew his I.D. That's when the trouble began. "I have no criminal record, neither in the Marshall Islands, or in the United States," said Mote in a telephone interview.
<snip>

According to the motion document, the original charge was that his permission to stay in the United States expired in December 31, 1999. Based on this information and lack of proof of his current status, he was charged with "failing to comply with conditions of status and being present in violation of the Act." This was an error.
<snip>

by Aenet Rowa, Yokwe Online, August 1, 2004
http://www.yokwe.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=860&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

Careful journalism, rather detailed descriptions.