Nearly 100 security guards at immigration facility hired without background investigations

By Gene Johnson
Seattle Times

A privately run immigration lockup in Tacoma hired nearly 100 security guards without background investigations, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement didn't catch the practice for two years, court documents show.

Sylvia Wong, an administrator in charge of hiring at the Northwest Detention Center, pleaded guilty this week in federal court in Tacoma to one count of making a false statement, for lying to investigators. In her plea agreement, she admitted that soon after starting work in November 2005, she began hiring guards without background investigations "because of the pressure she felt to get security personnel hired at the NWDC as quickly as possible."

ICE auditors discovered early this year that 92 guards had been hired without the checks. The agency acknowledges that some of the guards have been fired following subsequent background checks, but won't say how many.

"In response to this investigation we have implemented a multi-tiered vetting process ... so that no contractor or federal employee has sole responsibility to process and approve employment documents," ICE spokeswoman Lorie Dankers said Thursday. "We have taken proactive steps to prevent this from happening again."

The Northwest Detention Center opened in 2004 and holds about 1,000 people accused of immigration violations, mainly detainees from Alaska, Oregon and Washington. It's run by the for-profit, Florida-based GEO Group Inc., with yearly reviews to ensure the facility meets ICE standards.

A GEO Group spokesman has not returned several inquiries from the AP about Wong's case, the latest on Thursday. Her lawyer did not immediately return a call.

On Thursday, ICE announced that 10,602 aliens had been deported from Alaska, Oregon and Washington in fiscal 2008 - a one-year record for the region and a jump of more than 35 percent from the previous year.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicholas Brown said any pressure that Wong felt to hire guards quickly was self-imposed and did not come from higher-ups. If anything, he said, she was mostly trying "to make people happy."

When guards are hired at the detention center, they are supposed to undergo a preliminary background check. If they pass, they are given "entry on duty" forms allowing them to begin work pending a more thorough check, which can take several months to more than a year.

The plea agreement said that when Wong hired the guards, she fabricated "entry on duty" forms, allowing them to start work without any background check.

In February, ICE discovered that the guards had been hired without the checks and searched Wong's office. The next month, when agents questioned her, she insisted she had not manufactured the forms - hence, the "false statement" charge against her.

Brown said he did not know precisely how many of the guards Wong hired had been fired, but characterized the number as relatively small.

Asked what the number was, Dankers said, "I'm going to decline comment on that." Asked why, she replied, "Because I am."

She later called back to say policies prohibited her from discussing staffing levels - even though the number of fired guards has nothing to do with current staffing.

According to the plea agreement, the detention center has up to 200 security, administrative, medical, food service and maintenance workers.

Wong faces zero to six months when she is sentenced in February.

Posted by Pebi Services President Tyra Hearns

Ohio background investigations arriving after school has started

By LeeAnn Moore

Results of Ohio criminal background investigations on teachers, administrators, other school employees and even some volunteers will continue to come in over the next few months.

Sept. 5 was the deadline for most to have fingerprints turned into the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Ohio Attorney General's Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation (BCI).

"We believe that all of our employees have done that," said David Branch, Franklin Local School District superintendent. "However, we do not have all of the results because there is a rather large backlog at BCI in processing. Therefore, we do not have all the results of all the required testing, but we have a lot of it back."

Jim Heagen, superintendent of East Muskingum Local School District, said 100 percent of those in his district who needed to have prints submitted by Sept. 5 did so.

"The BCI/FBI system is inundated with all these requests. Now even veteran employees have to have it done," Heagen said. "They're inundated with all these people who had to have it submitted by Sept. 5. We're in the same boat as everyone else. 100 percent of our people have submitted but we're waiting on returns. As far as I know, we are following the law."

The Ohio Department of Education (ODE) began requiring applicants seeking any license or permit to have an Ohio criminal background investigation and an FBI criminal background check completed. The rule became effective Nov. 14, 2007 to comply with House Bill 190.

House Bill 79, which went into effect March 2007, requires those teaching with a professional teaching certificate to have a background investigation every five years on a date set by the state board of education. The first date established to have the checks completed by was Sept. 5.

"However, it's not a deadline for all prints as this deadline is only for teachers who teach under a permanent teaching certificate or an eight-year teaching certificate. Many teachers teach under a five-year teaching license. This Sept. 5 deadline doesn't apply to them. They receive background checks when the renew their license every five years," said Karla Warren, ODE press secretary.

Kevin Appleman, coordinator of operations and student services for Zanesville City Schools, said the process went smoothly the first time around.

Those needing to submit prints within Zanesville City started submitting them April 28 and they were all in by May 28. Appleman said most of the results are in and OK.

"Personally, I like it, because I think as a father myself who has a child in school, I appreciate it as a parent and as a person who facilitates it. I like it and I'm sure Mr. (Superintendent Terry) Martin does too because it protects everybody, our teachers, students, parents, administration, everybody," he said. "I don't think it's a bad thing at all. It's a positive."

In most cases, prints are submitted at the districts' administrative offices using WebCheck, an Internet-based program used for conducting fingerprint-based civilian background checks developed by BCI.

"ODE has been communicating aggressively with districts and with educators who hold eight-year, permanent or permanent non-tax certificates. They have been notified that those certificates would be inactivated if they did not submit fingerprints for mandated BCI and FBI background checks by Sept. 5, 2008," Warren said.

Posted by Pebi Services President Tyra Hearns

FBI assistant director William Hooten responds in Washington Post editorial letter to articles posted at this blog

ARTICLES FROM THIS BLOG RELATED TO MR. HOOTEN'S LETTER CAN BE FOUND HERE AND HERE

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

The June 14 editorial "The Name Game" told readers only half the story.

The editorial implied that the FBI is, through indifference, "punishing immigrants" by taking too long to complete some background checks for the Department of Homeland Security.

For years, the FBI did this job with great efficiency. We ran a computer check to see whether a person had been the named subject of an FBI investigation. After Sept. 11, 2001, however, the then-Immigration and Naturalization Service resubmitted 2.7 million names to be rechecked on a much broader criterion: whether they had been referenced in a negative manner in an FBI file.
From a processing standpoint, this meant that the FBI was required to review many more files in response to each individual background check request. This sometimes requires tracking down paper files across the country and overseas, or interviewing agents about current and old cases.

This avalanche, and the much deeper research required, created a backlog that no agency could have dispatched quickly. Even so, FBI employees complete almost 90 percent of these checks on time and have substantially reduced the number of pending Homeland Security checks this year.
While files containing possible derogatory information are found in less than 1 percent of Homeland Security requests, it is important to recall that it only took 19terrorists to kill 3,000 people. We take these checks very seriously.
We agree that some people were not well served by this process, and we continue to work hard to fix that. But we believe the other half of the story matters, too.

WILLIAM L. HOOTON
Assistant Director

Posted by Pebi Services President Tyra Hearns

Background Investigation delays stall green card holding individuals

By Emily Bazar, USA TODAY
Mohammad Barikbin came to the USA in 1988 and says he has spent every day since then fulfilling the American dream. The Iranian immigrant started a catering business in Philadelphia, then a taxi company and a taxi call center, all while investing in real estate. His 26-year-old son, Mehrdad, is a Marine. His 16-year-old son, Bijan, plays high school football. But there's a critical piece missing from Barikbin's American dream: He's not an American yet. Barikbin, 57, is a legal permanent resident, known as a "green card" holder. He is among nearly 68,000 legal immigrants whose citizenship applications have been stalled for six months or more by an FBI background investigation of their names. Some have been waiting for years with little or no information about the status of their applications or the reasons for the delay.
"I'm like a man with no country," he says. "I feel American, but the government is not identifying me that way." He says he has no idea what is delaying his name check but suspects it's because he's from Iran, which is accused of sponsoring terrorism. Barikbin, whose application has been pending for 3½ years, has joined a surge of immigrants turning to the courts to force U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to complete their background investigations and act on their applications. The background investigation involves running an applicant's name through terrorism and criminal watch lists. Tyra Hearns the President of background investigation firm Pebi Services made note of this particular dillema in her blog when she noted in her article "FBI skimps on background investigations on aliens" the continuing saga of long delays. "It really is a dual edged sword as the complete background investigation helps to insure safety and documentation but yet it delays the process." said Hearns
In 2005, about 270 lawsuits filed against USCIS were over delayed name checks, says USCIS spokesman Chris Bentley. Last year, there were more than 4,400 such suits. "People realized the only way they were going to get their names cleared was to file litigation," says Crystal Williams of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. "We've never seen the volume we're seeing now." Most of the suits are still pending, she says.

Delays 'unacceptable'

U.S. District Judge Michael Baylson consolidated Barikbin's lawsuit with those of five other citizenship applicants. On Feb. 8, he called the delays "unacceptable," ordered USCIS to draft regulations for its name-check process or stop using it, and gave the agency 30 days to tell the immigrants why their cases have been delayed. "Plaintiffs have experienced delays of many months to several years, incurred substantial expenses and lived with the resulting uncertainty in their personal and professional lives, and immeasurable impact on their families," Baylson wrote.

He said the name check delays pose "an increased risk to national security" because applicants remain in the country for months or years while awaiting the results. USCIS contracts with the FBI to do the name checks. There is a separate fingerprint search through criminal files. Bentley says 99% of the checks are done in less than six months. Eventually "a very high percentage" of the remaining 1% are cleared, he says. FBI spokesman Bill Carter says the backlog stems from late 2002, when USCIS sent the names of more than 2.7 million immigrants to the FBI for a second, more thorough check. "That was from an abundance of caution after 9/11," he says.

The first step is to run an applicant's name through computerized FBI databases, Carter says. If the name matches one in an FBI case file, an employee must investigate, which may involve searches of paper files "in any number of places," he says. "There are more than 265 FBI facilities that could house information. … We have to remember the national security of this country is at stake." Applicants with common names or names with various spellings, such as Mohammad or Sean, are more likely to generate hits. Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., says she plans to question FBI officials about the delays at a hearing next month. She wants USCIS to use some of the money from a recent increase in application fees to hire more name checkers.

Some policy changes

USCIS officials say they're taking steps to speed the process, such as nearly quadrupling last year's $7.9 million budget. Carter says the FBI will use the money to automate paper files and add 111 workers to the 150 already checking names. For people seeking green cards, not citizenship, the agency has changed its policy. Those whose name checks have been pending for more than six months will be accepted as long as they meet all other requirements. If a name then came back linked to crime or terrorism, the Department of Homeland Security would revoke the green card and begin deportation proceedings. That doesn't help Barikbin. He fled Iran in 1982 to escape political turmoil and spent five years in Germany before entering the USA with his wife, Fery, and son Mehrdad.

They became legal permanent residents in 1999 and applied for citizenship in 2004. Mehrdad became a citizen a year later; Fery won her citizenship last year after the couple filed suit. Because he's not a citizen, Barikbin doesn't have a passport. He could request permission to travel overseas and try to get a visa from another country, but he hasn't done that because friends with green cards have tried and failed, he says. He hasn't seen most of his relatives in 26 years, including his mother, who died in December.

Although he says he's been treated "unfairly," Barikbin eagerly awaits the benefits of citizenship, such as voting.

"Whatever I can do for this country," he says, "I am ready to do it."