Another kritarch has struck at immigration law enforcement and created a new right for illegal aliens; this time it is not the right not to be handcuffed, but the right not to be arrested at a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) office if you are foolish enough to apply for an immigration benefit for which you are not eligible and are an illegal alien. Mark Wolf (sadly, a Reagan appointee) seems to think that illegal aliens have the right not to be arrested when applying for an immigration benefit. Wolf appears to think that merely applying for a benefit gives you immunity from arrest.

A federal judge in Boston is demanding that immigration authorities explain why a Guatemalan mother of two was arrested and jailed for nearly a month after going to a government office to apply for legal residency.

On Jan. 17, Lilian Pahola Calderon Jimenez, a 30-year-old waitress whose parents brought her to the United States when she was 3, had just finished an interview with officials from Citizenship and Immigration Services in Johnston, R.I., when she was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers.

On Tuesday, she was released without explanation, eight days before US District Judge Mark Wolf was slated to hear her petition for release.

In an order handed down Thursday, Wolf pressed immigration officials for answers.

[Judge Demands Answers From ICE On Detention Of Young Mother, by Maria Cramer, Boston Globe, February 16, 2018]

One wonders how this Wolf person became an attorney, much less a Federal Judge. He appears to be the most ignorant, obtuse, and arrogant fool who ever sat on the Federal bench.

To educate Wolf, the Immigration and Nationality Act, as amended, gives immigration officers the authority to arrest illegal aliens, especially those with an outstanding deportation order—the story says Calderon has had a deportation order against her since 2002, when she was 15 years old.

Powers of immigration officers and employees

(a) Powers without warrant

Any officer or employee of the Service authorized under regulations prescribed by the Attorney General shall have power without warrant—

(1) to interrogate any alien or person believed to be an alien as to his right to be or to remain in the United States;

(2) to arrest any alien who in his presence or view is entering or attempting to enter the United States in violation of any law or regulation made in pursuance of law regulating the admission, exclusion, expulsion, or removal of aliens, or to arrest any alien in the United States, if he has reason to believe that the alien so arrested is in the United States in violation of any such law or regulation and is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained for his arrest, but the alien arrested shall be taken without unnecessary delay for examination before an officer of the Service having authority to examine aliens as to their right to enter or remain in the United States.

[Title 8 United States Code, Section 1357, Powers of Immigration Officers and Employees, Government Publishing Office, undated]

The authority to arrest illegal aliens is quite clearly defined. The real question is why Kritarch Wolf would make such stupid and legally baseless claims that illegal aliens cannot be arrested while illegally applying for immigration benefits? In this case, adjustment of status from illegal alien to legal permanent residence.

Some background is necessary for the reader though; those illegal aliens who enter the United States without inspection are ineligible to adjust status in the United States without a waiver of the grounds of inadmissibility.

Other than an alien having an approved petition for classification as a VAWA self-petitioner, subsection (a) shall not be applicable to...(7) any alien who seeks adjustment of status to that of an immigrant under section 1153(b) of this title and is not in a lawful nonimmigrant status; or (8) any alien who was employed while the alien was an unauthorized alien, as defined in section 1324a(h)(3) of this title, or who has otherwise violated the terms of a nonimmigrant visa.

[Title 8 United States Code, Section 1255(c), Adjustment Of Status Of Nonimmigrant To That Of Person Admitted For Permanent Residence, Legal Information Institute, undated]

And to make it perfectly clear, Congress gave immigration officers the authority not only to arrest illegal aliens, but to detain them as well.

(a) Arrest, detention, and release on a warrant issued by the Attorney General, an alien may be arrested and detained pending a decision on whether the alien is to be removed from the United States. Except as provided in subsection (c) and pending such decision, the Attorney General—

(1) may continue to detain the arrested alien

[Title 8 United States Code, Section 1226, Apprehension and Detention of Aliens, Legal Information Institute, undated]

So, there it is, the law is quite clear: illegal aliens may be arrested and detained. There are no restrictions in the law regarding where that arrest may be done, nor may certain illegal aliens like Lilian Pahola Calderon Jimenez   adjust status in the United States.

Kritarch Wolf appears to be excised about arrests in USCIS office, where illegal aliens who think they can go to change their status from illegal to legal.

“The court has not been informed of the procedures that led to Calderon’s release, the reasons for it, or whether ICE asserts that it had lawfully detained Calderon and has the authority to do so again in the same manner,” Wolf wrote.

Wolf seems to border on irrationality, babbling about a pattern of arrests, e.g. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Deportation Officers doing their jobs as provided by statute, arresting illegal aliens, including those with outstanding deportation orders.

Calderon’s arrest was “part of a pattern,” Wolf noted, outlining the case of Fabiano Mateus de Oliveira, a Brazilian national also arrested in January after he went to a government office seeking permanent residency through his marriage to an American.

In March 2017, Leandro Arriaga Gil and four other unauthorized immigrants were arrested at a Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Lawrence under similar circumstances, the order noted.

Instead of questioned and insulted by a Federal District Judge, ICE should be congratulated for aggressively enforcing the laws of the United States.

And Kritarch Wolf appears to be violating the Code of Judicial Conduct by making determinations about cases before he has heard presentations by both sides in a case in a hearing.

Arriaga was abruptly released three months later, just before a scheduled hearing before Wolf, who had indicated he was willing to overrule immigration authorities and order Arriaga’s release.

Kritarch Wolf violated Canon 3 of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges in three of its parts:

Canon 3: A Judge Should Perform the Duties of the Office Fairly, Impartially and Diligently

(1) A judge should be faithful to, and maintain professional competence in, the law and should not be swayed by partisan interests, public clamor, or fear of criticism...

(3) A judge should be patient, dignified, respectful, and courteous to litigants, jurors, witnesses, lawyers, and others with whom the judge deals in an official capacity.

(4) A judge should accord to every person who has a legal interest in a proceeding, and that person’s lawyer, the full right to be heard according to law.

[Code of Conduct for United States Judges, United States Courts, undated]

As above, Kritarch Wolf violated section (1) by not maintaining competence in Federal law. His ignorance of the relevant laws governing the case of the arrest and detention of Calderon is shocking. Furthermore, his obviously partisan interest and bias with regard to protecting illegal aliens from arrest also violated section 1.

Kritarch Wolf also violated section (3) , where he was impatient, discourteous, and undignified by demanding an explanation for what was clearly and obviously legal behavior by ICE Deportation Officers.

Kritarch Wolf violated section (4) by failing to accord to the people of the United States, represented by the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security, a full and impartial hearing to the case at hand by threatening to order the release of an illegal alien before the hearing over that alien's detention was held.

Kritarch Wolf also appears to be colluding with the illegal alien in the case, accepting an inaccurate description of immigration law put forward by the illegal alien's attorney:

Calderon, who was given a deportation order in 2002, when she was 15 years old, applied for residency in 2016 under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. That was denied, with the government claiming she had not provided enough evidence of a continued presence in the country.

While that application was pending, she also sought residency through her husband. High school sweethearts, the couple has a 2-year-old boy and a 4-year-old girl, according to court documents.

To gain legal status, the couple would have to go through several steps, the first of which was proving their marriage was not fraudulent. During the January interview, Calderon and her husband had just been told their marriage had been recognized as legitimate. She was still in the office when ICE officers arrested her, according to her lawyers.

“This seizure occurred even though Ms. Calderon followed procedures that the government itself has prescribed for avoiding such a tragedy,” her lawyers wrote in a petition challenging her detention.

“In effect, the government’s left hand beckoned her forward, and its right hand grabbed her...”

He also asked federal officials to say whether Calderon could be detained again and whether other people besides Calderon and de Oliveira were arrested as they sought permanent residency at a government office in Massachusetts or Rhode Island in January.

First, there was no way for the couple— the illegal alien in fact,  as Calderonwas the illegal alien, not her husband—to gain legal status. Illegal aliens who enter without inspection cannot adjust status, so there was no way to "gain legal status."

Second, USCIS does not determine if a marriage was fraudulent in such cases, as Calderon's application to adjust status wasn'tdenied because of marriage fraud, but because she had no right adjust in the first place. There was no interview to determine the legitimacy of the marriage, but Calderon was called into the USCIS office to have her case denied, then be arrested.

There was no beckoning her forward, then grabbing her. It was either their own ignorance or an incompetent attorney who advised them that Calderon could adjust her status in the United States. And there were no "procedures that the government itself has prescribed for avoiding such a tragedy" in such a case, as there are no safe harbor provisions for Calderon to avoid arrest for being an illegal alien. Such a claim by Calderon's attorney is false and the apparent acceptance of that claim by Kritarch Wolf is the height of dishonesty.

All this nonsense is compounded by the fact that Calderon and her attorney are claiming that they were tricked into presenting her to be arrested. Well, there is nothing illegal, unethical, or immoral about that. In fact, it is for the safety of the arrestee and the arresting officers, as all persons entering a Federal office, in this case a USCIS office, are searched for weapons before being allowed to enter.

And it also saves the taxpayers money by making the arrest easier and less costly; an office arrest needs only one officer, while in the field four or more officers would be used, and this is not counting the associated expenses, such as fuel and vehicle wear, that are saved.

Kritarch Wolf is a danger to the integrity of the Federal judiciary as evidenced by his bias, partisan interest in illegal aliens, and incompetence in the law. Time to impeach him.