None of the authorities are here to help you.

April 2, 2018 2:30 PM

A Betrayal: The teenager told police all about his gang, MS-13. In return, he was slated for deportation and marked for death. In an absolutely horrifying case involving bureaucracy, racism, and apathy at the hands of the FBI, ICE, and MS-13, a young man risked his life to help the FBI catch gang members and murderers; they hung him out to dry. ICE ordered him deported via the same facility to which they'd sent the MS-13 members he'd informed on, eventually sending a memo explicitly detailing how he informed on the gang and its members. The Trump administration is repeating many of the circumstances that lead to the establishment of MS-13 in the first place. TW: Violence, murder.

Previously: The Butterfly and the Knife in Court

The Lives that are US immigration Talking Points

posted by MaximumTaco (31 comments total)

Apologies if I missed any MeFi posting etiquette, first time actually submitting anything after many years. Reddit is not a fun place to discuss things like this especially these days :(

I've followed Hannah Dreier's writing since she was a correspondent in Venezuela and this story just shook me. I can't imagine how helpless and horrible this man's life has become as a result of this case. It would take so little effort for them to protect him and do things right, but everyone involved seems to just wave their hands at everyone else, with the likely result of this (effectively) child soldier being sent back to die at the hands of the people he tried to stop, abetted by the American government.

His asylum hearing is on April 5th.
posted by MaximumTaco at 2:35 PM on April 2, 2018 [10 favorites]

This is such a mess and such a horrible situation. His testimony led to the arrest of many members of a legitimately scary gang, and not one law enforcement member was willing to testify in his defense? And it turns out that the FBI agent he was working with/for wasn't even a part of a task force focusing on M-13? Like, he was moonlighting? Like, it was a hobby of his? And ICE claims they didn't know he was an informant DESPITE having a detention memo that describes just that?

Garbage. They're all garbage.
posted by thecjm at 2:43 PM on April 2, 2018 [49 favorites]

This kid is ridiculously brave.
posted by entropone at 2:44 PM on April 2, 2018 [9 favorites]

Oh man, that poor kid. :(
posted by grumpybear69 at 2:53 PM on April 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

Just reading the frame of the post has me feeling ill, I don't know that I can get into the details because this type of news is so distressing and once reason why I'm moving away from social media/news type of stuff. These types of stories are happening too too often. I appreciate the investigative reporting that goes into this as it should be discussed and exposed but personally speaking, it just fucks me up. Ugh.
posted by Fizz at 2:59 PM on April 2, 2018 [9 favorites]

For fuck's sake, people like this kid are so incredibly important. His treatment was inexcusable.
posted by GoblinHoney at 3:03 PM on April 2, 2018 [9 favorites]

Never trust the cops (emph. added):

Johnson texted [Suffolk County detective] Rivera, asking him to share what he knew at Henry’s asylum hearing, which is slated for April 5. Rivera texted back the names of two boys that Henry had helped get arrested. But he refused to testify, citing concern for his own safety. “My job doesn’t allow me to do that,” he wrote, “especially in my situation being an enemy of MS-13 and several certain individuals incarcerated for murder.” The federal prosecutor overseeing the murder cases involving the Sailors also declined to assist in Henry’s defense, as did [school police officer] Politis.

Sure, an armed police detective with the full backing of the state vs. a 17-year-old locked up in ICE detention with the very gang members he snitched on.
posted by mhum at 3:27 PM on April 2, 2018 [53 favorites]

Okay, it's time for me to donate to propublica. Past time.
posted by el io at 3:31 PM on April 2, 2018 [7 favorites]

JFC what are we even doing.
posted by Space Kitty at 3:31 PM on April 2, 2018 [9 favorites]

Never ever, for any reason, speak to the police or a government lawyer without a lawyer of your own. This piece of advice might not have done much in the context of this story, but it illustrates the fundamental principle:

The police do not exist to help you. Ever. Don't trust them and don't help them.
posted by East14thTaco at 3:38 PM on April 2, 2018 [56 favorites]

Meanwhile, I guess it goes without saying that every MS-13 enforcer will have this article bookmarked, printed out, and/or the particulars committed to memory so that everyone gets the message: snitching to the cops will not protect you from ICE deporting you anyways. Great job, everyone.
posted by mhum at 3:48 PM on April 2, 2018 [16 favorites]

Sadly, This weeks John Oliver helped highlight another related issue in the fact that in immigration matters, even children don't have a "right" to council so children as young as 3 have to represent themselves in court!!!
posted by Megafly at 3:58 PM on April 2, 2018 [9 favorites]

I also feel terrible for the poor teacher who thought they were helping Henry and ended up doing this.
posted by jeather at 4:42 PM on April 2, 2018 [2 favorites]

Well, if their policy was to automatically deport all Latin American immigrants as gang members, then accidentally-on-purpose making an example of him, to strongly discourage other immigrants from doing the right thing and set down the facts on the ground that they are likely to be (voluntarily or involuntarily) beholden to MS-13, would be one way to go about it.
posted by acb at 4:44 PM on April 2, 2018 [4 favorites]

Stories like this make me rethink my past rebuttal of blanket condemnation of law enforcement agents.
posted by RolandOfEld at 4:46 PM on April 2, 2018 [4 favorites]

Are these people stupid or just malicious or this horrifying blend of both? I wish I knew.
As soon as I saw that this was Long Island I knew what town it was. I'm from Brentwood's cousin next door. I don't have anything to add but just sad about all of this. It all seems so unnecessary. Like just stop. Just, stop all of this.
posted by bleep at 5:23 PM on April 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

I am worried for him. If he gets deported back, he's going to get murdered for this.
posted by yueliang at 5:25 PM on April 2, 2018 [4 favorites]

never trust a cop
posted by complaina at 5:38 PM on April 2, 2018 [6 favorites]

That part in the article where they were like 'Oh yeah we definitely should not make detention memos a thing, wow, let's fix that'. Like, that is your takeaway from this??? And what will be the outcome of taking away those memos, people just flat out not being informed why they're being locked up?? Jesus Christ.
posted by bleep at 5:52 PM on April 2, 2018 [7 favorites]

I don't think we can rule out the possibility this was merely tying up loose ends.

Informants know the dirt on both sides; they might know when evidence was planted, when officers perjure themselves, when somebody was allowed to bleed out before the ambulance was called or was shot in the back, and above all when two suitcases of cash were seized but only one makes it into evidence.

But in the case of this kid, none of that could have been much of a problem if he'd been deported as planned.
posted by jamjam at 8:12 PM on April 2, 2018 [3 favorites]

Megafly: "This weeks John Oliver helped highlight another related issue in the fact that in immigration matters, even children don't have a "right" to council so children as young as 3 have to represent themselves in court!!!"

The whole segment was full of disturbing examples of misjustice. EG: the wide disparity in the outcomes before different courts. Some deport 80+% of the people that come up in front of them and others 23%. You can probably guess correctly the locations where the tails on that distribution lie. The length of time and number of questions asked (less than 2 minutes and 2 in a highlighted case). The easy to find examples were people said "I'll be killed by the people who killed my extended family if I'm deported"; were deported; and then to no one's surprise were killed.
posted by Mitheral at 9:00 PM on April 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

Tangent: is there a way to know how active MS-13 is in a different state, and whether its high school kids face the same dangers as the students on Long Island?
posted by Baeria at 10:42 PM on April 2, 2018

This is beyond racism, it is doing evil because you know you can suffer no consequences. Depraved, there is no other word for it.
posted by epo at 4:38 AM on April 3, 2018 [12 favorites]

Sadly, This weeks John Oliver helped highlight another related issue in the fact that in immigration matters, even children don't have a "right" to council so children as young as 3 have to represent themselves in court!!!

This is completely horrible but also potentially cute. Ahhhh the internet has broken me.
posted by srboisvert at 5:43 AM on April 3, 2018

Your tax dollars and democracy in action. A horrible travesty of trust.
posted by DJZouke at 6:18 AM on April 3, 2018 [1 favorite]

This is completely horrible but also potentially cute.
The LWT crew hammered the point home with this example.
Honestly the end result makes about as much sense as what keeps happening in the immigration courts.

I hope the reporting on this somehow makes a difference. I don't know how it can for Henry, at this point, but I hope it does.
posted by halation at 6:33 AM on April 3, 2018 [2 favorites]

A future in which ICE still exists is a failed future.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:32 AM on April 3, 2018 [1 favorite]

I understand that as a society we need certain types of law enforcement. We need a federal police agency that's in charge of enforcing federal laws. We need an overseas intelligence agency that protects US agents through spy stuff. We need an agency that enforces immigration laws.

The problem is that the FBI has such a long history of corrupt immoral and at times illegal behavior that its entire culture is bankrupt and unethical that it hurts the country that it purports to serve.
The problem is that the CIA has such a long history of corrupt immoral and at times illegal behavior that its entire culture is bankrupt and unethical that it hurts the country that it purports to serve.
The problem is that the ICE has such a long history of corrupt immoral and at times illegal behavior that its entire culture is bankrupt and unethical that it hurts the country that it purports to serve.

Whats 'amazing' about this is ICE is so new, and yet they are already completely fucked (this is in part because of how it recruited to begin with, specifically WHO it recruited).
posted by el io at 12:22 PM on April 3, 2018 [4 favorites]

Yeah, who would have thought that filling an entire agency with xenophobic, racist, unqualified assholes would lead to misbehaviour... The magic expanding 'no rights border zone' is a whole other layer of the problem too.
posted by MaximumTaco at 2:20 PM on April 3, 2018

A brief update from ProPublica ahead of the hearing, "Teenage MS-13 Gang Informant Heads Into Final Asylum Hearing." And, just in case you thought that ICE was anything less than 100% asshole:

His lawyer Bryan Johnson plans to argue that Henry committed the murder under duress, like a child soldier. He says information told to police by a teenager who believed he was going to be placed in witness protection should not be admitted as evidence. In a filing Wednesday, ICE bypassed most of Johnson’s arguments and came back to the murder: “He plainly admits to homicide,” a government lawyer wrote.

Meanwhile, further down in the article, there's mention of the widespread support that Henry is getting now that his story is getting more publicity, including a local Suffolk County official who had previously worked in a gang task force, because everyone can appreciate the fundamental injustice at play here.
posted by mhum at 12:44 PM on April 5, 2018 [1 favorite]

Another update from ProPublica reporting from the hearing, "Teen Who Faced Deportation After He Informed on MS-13 Gets Temporary Reprieve:

Amid a flood of attention brought to the case by a ProPublica and New York magazine report published Monday, Judge Thomas Mulligan declined to issue a ruling. Instead, he gave the teen’s lawyer a list of evidence and testimony he wants to see before deciding the case in May. The judge seemed to be sketching a path to a successful asylum claim, and mentioned an alternative defense if asylum cannot be supported.

Looks like the judge realizes what's going on here. Meanwhile, what's ICE up to? Oh, just this:

As the hearing began, an issue of New York magazine lay on the table between the ICE attorney and Henry. Several people agreed to testify after the story ran, including a gang expert, Henry’s FBI Gang Task Force handler, and the superintendent of Henry’s high school district. The government opposed each one. ICE contended that the expert did not seem qualified. A Suffolk County lawyer argued that because the handler is an FBI employee, he has to be subpoenaed in a special way. And the ICE attorney said the superintendent’s testimony seemed irrelevant. But the judge wanted to hear from them all.

The ICE lawyer also argued that Henry’s lawyer should recuse himself, because he had become a witness by exchanging text messages with the FBI handler. In those messages, the handler confirmed that Henry helped get fellow MS-13 members arrested. ICE objections took up the first half of the four-hour afternoon hearing, and in the end, only Henry had time to testify.

Maybe the ICE lawyer is simply providing vigorous representation for their client. But, even if that were the case, that would mean that ICE itself is simply Not Letting It Go.
posted by mhum at 11:56 AM on April 6, 2018