New Identification system can spot illegals

The Mecklenburg County Sheriff's Office has a new tool to help identify illegal immigrants arrested in Charlotte. Under the new immigrant identification system, inmates who were not born in the United States will have their digital image and fingerprints sent to a national database to determine if they have the proper documentation.

Those who are undocumented will be deported upon completion of their jail term. Two inmates underwent the verification process Wednesday morning and both were found to be illegal with a prior criminal record, information that might have gone unnoticed without the new system.

Mecklenburg County Sheriff Jim Pendergraph is confident that fewer illegal immigrants will slip through the cracks. “Once their state charges now are taken care of and they have served the time they are convicted on the state charges, there’s a detainer placed on them today, where they won’t be able to get out of jail and they’ll be deported again,” he said.

The system has been up and running for about two weeks. Pendergraph says about 80 inmates have gone through it, and about half of them are currently in the process of being deported.

Source: News 14 Carolina