The Criminal Record Trap: How ICE Uses Past Convictions to Justify Present Crimes

DISAPPEARED: A Nation on Trial — Part One

“The disappearance is a perfect crime. There is no body, no suspect, no trial. Only silence.”
— Ariel Dorfman

“When they came for me, there was no one left to speak for me.”
— Martin Niemöller

I’ve watched ICE play this game before. But what’s happening now isn’t a game. It’s a trap.

A trap built on criminal records and rigged processes. A trap designed not just to ensnare the men they want gone, but to convince the rest of us to look the other way while it happens.

The Smoke and the Screen

Over the last two weeks, the government has disappeared people from detention facilities and claimed it was removal. They’ve named South Sudan, Djibouti, Libya. Then they said Burma. Then they refused to say anything at all.

But when you hear the same thing from different men across different states, that they were told one country, then another, that the paperwork didn’t match, that no interview ever came, you realize the problem isn’t the paper. It’s the plan.

The plan is to get rid of them. And the method is confusion. Ambiguity. Legal misdirection. Disappearance.

Criminal Records as Weapons

In interview after interview, the government has leaned on one thing to justify the unjustifiable: past convictions.

From my conversation with

Jasmine Garsd

from NPR:

“No meaningful opportunity at all was provided to him to express a fear of being sent to South Sudan. And let's be honest, it's quite possible that my client has never heard of South Sudan.”

My client was given two contradictory orders in English. No interpreter. No hearing. No legal access. Then, gone.

As I told MSN,

“You take a man with limited English, detain him in a rural facility far from legal help, hand him contradictory orders in a language he cannot read, deny him interpretation, deny him a hearing, deny him access to his attorney — and then remove him without notice.”

That’s not deportation. That’s state disappearance.

The Distraction Doctrine

Instead of defending their actions, the administration wants to change the subject. As I told Mother Jones,

“This is not about sending this man or a group of men to another country because of their criminal backgrounds. What this is actually about is the executive branch boldly and blatantly disregarding a federal court order, potentially in a state of criminal contempt.”

And the real danger?

“If we allow the government to pick and choose who deserves due process and who has rights, we're relinquishing all rights,”

I said to the BBC. These are not privileges that are reserved for the innocent or the well-liked. These are fundamental rights that protect us all.

The Paper Trail to Nowhere

In the case of N.M., ICE issued three different removal orders in rapid succession: Libya, then South Africa, then South Sudan. Ultimately, they claimed he was removed to Burma. But they wouldn’t confirm. And neither would the detention center.

As I told ABC News:

“The truth is, I don’t know where my client is.”

I’ve received conflicting updates. A series of orders in English. No interpreter. No clarity. No confirmed location. In my professional experience, and I’ve been representing people in immigration detention since 2005, I’ve never seen anything like it.

What I do know is this: my client is gone. And the government has not met even the most basic standard of proof or process to say otherwise.

Due Process for the Unpopular

I said this to NewsNation, and I’ll say it again:

“If he is ultimately deported under the law, then that’s one matter. But that’s not what we’re talking about here. What we’re talking about here is someone who has been ‘disappeared’ without following legal procedures to an unknown location.”

That’s not removal. That’s authoritarianism.

The legal system I was trained in, the one I’ve practiced in for twenty years, doesn’t give up its integrity based on whether someone is liked. Or innocent. Or American-born.

Rights aren’t rights if we treat them like privileges.

What Comes Next

This is the first in a three-part series tracking how the United States is redefining deportation, not as a legal proceeding, but as a clandestine maneuver with no accountability.

If you haven’t read it yet, start here: Memorial Day in the Age of Disappearance. That piece laid the foundation.

Memorial Day in the Age of Disappearance

And this one? This is the reckoning.

Part Two: Deported for Leverage: How the U.S. May Be Trading Human Lives for Diplomatic Favors drops Friday.

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