Legal and illegal immigrants were less likely to be incarcerated than native-born Americans in 2017, just as they were in 2014 and 2016. Those incarcerated do not represent the total number of immigrants who can be deported under current law or the complete number of convicted immigrant criminals who are in the United States but merely those who are incarcerated. The younger the immigrants are upon their arrival in the United States and the longer that they are here, the more likely they are to be incarcerated as adults
(Source: Criminal Immigrants in 2017: Their Numbers, Demographics, and Countries of Origin, Cato Institute, March 4, 2019).
Another study, published in March in the journal Criminology, looked at population-level crime rates: do places with higher percentages of undocumented immigrants have higher rates of crime? The answer is a resounding no.
States with larger shares of undocumented immigrants tended to have lower crime rates than states with smaller shares in the years 1990 through 2014. “Increases in the undocumented immigrant population within states are associated with significant decreases in the prevalence of violence,” authors Michael T. Light and Ty Miller found.
That’s just a simple correlation, of course, and it’s well-documented that many factors beyond immigration can affect the crime rate. So Light and Miller ran a number of statistical analyses to more clearly isolate the effects of illegal immigration from those other factors. Among other things, they find that the relationship between high levels of illegal immigration and low levels of crime persists even after controlling for various economic and demographic factors such as age, urbanization, labor market conditions, and incarceration rates.
Our study calls into question one of the primary justifications for the immigration enforcement buildup Light and Miller concluded: “Any set of immigration policies moving forward should be crafted with the empirical understanding that undocumented immigration does not seem to have increased violent crime
(Source: “Two Charts Demolish the Notion That Immigrants Here Illegally Commit More Crime,” Washington Post, June 19, 2018).
The complete picture
Most states and our federal government have kept information and statistics about illegal immigration, crimes committed by illegals, and the costs borne by you, the US payer, out of public view. It is in fact difficult but not impossible to locate accurate crime statistics involving illegal immigrants. The statistics are buried both to suit a political agenda and to avoid public outcry. Once you read this article, you will quickly understand why.
The Pew Research Institute estimates that as of 2014, there are at least 11.2 million illegal immigrants residing in the US. This population comprises approximately 3.5 percent of our country’s population.
Of these, by far, the largest ethnic population, 52 percent, are Hispanics comprised of Mexicans, Central Americans, and Cubans.
Six states—California, Texas, Illinois, Florida, New York, and New Jersey—account for 59 percent of all illegal immigrants residing in the US. The fact that 66 percent of all illegal immigrants have lived in our nation for over ten years underscores our long-standing inability to address the serious problem of our inability to control our nation’s borders.
Research conducted by the federal government oversight organization Judicial Watch in 2014 documents that 50 percent of all federal crimes were committed near our border with Mexico.
Of the 61,529 criminal cases filed by federal prosecutors, 40 percent or 24,746 were in court districts along the southern borders of California, Arizona, and Texas.
The Western District of Texas had the nation’s most significant crime rate with over 6,300 cases filed, followed by the Southern District of Texas with slightly over 6,000 cases.
The Southern California District with nearly 4,900 cases, New Mexico with nearly 4,000 cases, and Arizona with over 3,500 criminal cases ranked third, fourth, and fifth.
The US Department of Justice documents that in 2014, 19 percent or over 12,000 criminal cases filed by prosecutors were for violent crimes, and over 22 percent or 13,300 cases were for drug-related felonies. That same year, the US Sentencing Commission found that 75 percent of all criminal defendants who were convicted and sentenced for federal drug offenses were illegal immigrants. Illegal immigrants were also involved in 17 percent of all drug trafficking sentences and one-third of all federal prison sentences.
The US Department of Justice and the US Sentencing Commission reported that as of 2014, illegal immigrants were convicted and sentenced for over 13 percent of all crimes committed in the US.
According to the FBI, 67,642 murders were committed in the US from 2005 through 2008 and 115,717 from 2003 through 2009. The General Accountability Office documents that criminal immigrants committed 25,064 of these murders.
Illegal immigrants clearly commit a level of violent and drug-related crimes disproportionate to their population.
In California alone, over 2,400 illegal immigrants out of a total prison population of 130,000 are imprisoned in the state’s prison system for the crime of homicide.
The pro-illegal immigrant lobby consistently misrepresents the criminal involvement of illegal immigrants as compared to immigrants who legally enter the US and American citizens saying that illegal immigrants commit less crimes than their counterparts. This assertion is false in most cases. Here are the vetted statistics:
In California, there are just over 92 illegal immigrants imprisoned for every 100,000 illegals as compared to 74 citizens and legal noncitizen immigrants. In Arizona, the rate is nearly 69 illegals imprisoned for every 100,000, as compared to 54 citizens and legal noncitizen immigrants.
In New York, over three times as many illegal immigrants, or 169, are imprisoned for crimes per 100,000, as compared to only 48 citizens and legal noncitizen immigrants. Only in the states of Texas and Florida do illegal immigrants commit less crimes than their legal immigrant counterparts (Texas with 54.5 illegals imprisoned per 100,000, compared to 65 legal immigrants and Florida with 55 illegals imprisoned compared to 68 legal immigrants).
Recent crime analysis by both the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Texas law enforcement authorities indicates that between June 2011 and March 2017, over 217,000 criminal immigrants were arrested and booked into Texas jails.
In researching the criminal careers of these defendants, it was revealed that they had jointly committed over nearly 600,000 criminal offenses. Their arrests included nearly 1,200 homicides; almost 69,000 assaults; 16,854 burglaries; 700 kidnappings; nearly 6,200 sexual assaults; 69,000 drug offenses; 8,700 weapons violations; over 3,800 robberies; and over 45,000 obstructing police charges. In determining the status of these offenders in the US, it was confirmed by DHS that over 173,000 or 66 percent of these immigrant criminal defendants were in our country illegally at the times of their arrests
(Source: from The Hill April 19, 2017—“The Truth about Crime, Illegal Immigrants and Sanctuary Cities,” by Ron Martinelli, former Spanish-speaking career detective who investigated violent crimes within the Hispanic and other ethnic immigrant communities, also a forensic criminologist who is a subject matter expert in violent crime, who advocates for facts and evidence).
Using newly released detailed data on all prisoners who entered the Arizona State prison from January 1985 through June 2017, we are able to separate non-US citizens by whether they are illegal or legal residents. This data does not rely on self-reporting