Big Apple ‘sanctuary’ for outlaws

Hands tied on deporting

As New York City grapples with a wave of migrant crime — punctuated by recent high-profile incidents that left cops injured — many have wondered why federal immigration authorities aren’t deporting suspected criminals at a more rapid rate.

But immigration experts told The Post on Tuesday that it can be hard — both legally and logistically — for the feds to remove migrants before they’re convicted of a crime.

They said some of the difficulty stems from the city’s sanctuary laws, which bar local police from contacting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement or honoring “detainers” the agency puts out.

A current ICE official told The Post that the sanctuary city laws are helping propel the recent crime wave — which includes the April 2 incident in which a cop was injured when two Venezuelan migrants accused of shoplifting fought back during arrest.

The NYPD, the official said, “will not contact immigration at all.”

“ICE has no idea,” the official said, adding that the city also bars the agency’s officers from entering its shelters to make arrests.

‘No deterrent’

Two specific sanctuary laws have proven particularly contentious. One stops the city from honoring immigration authorities’ requests to hold criminal suspects in custody unless they’ve been convicted of specific violent offenses — and a judge has signed a warrant for their removal. The other bars the use of city resources to help immigration enforcement.

But even if ICE made the collars, it’s still hard to send them back to countries like Venezuela, which continues to refuse deportation flights that return its own citizens, former ICE field office director John Fabbricatore told The Post.

“Because Venezuela is a recalcitrant country that refuses to accept back its citizens, we have a situation where there is no deterrent for the criminals that have entered the country illegally,” said Fabbricatore, who is now running for Congress in Colorado’s 6th District.

Whenever ICE agents make the arrest, cases are reviewed to figure out whether they’re a “priority” for enforcement, the official said.

The arrests and custody determinations are made case-by-case, and are often influenced by the severity of the crime and the suspect’s standing.

‘Gone too easy’

Further complicating matters, ICE is limited on bed space, the official said. And in some cases, the agency releases lower-level criminals to free up room for those considered a higher priority.

“Cases like this highlight the issue and show that illegal aliens no longer fear deportation,” Fabbricatore said.

The Post has reached out to ICE for comment.

Michael Wildes, a New York City immigration lawyer, said migrants accused of crimes should be heard in court.

“You don’t deport somebody without first giving them a day in criminal court,” Wildes told The Post on Tuesday. “Once they’ve had their day in court, if they’re guilty, they serve their time and then they go, courtesy of ICE, directly onto an airplane.

“They should be enforcing the laws on the books, and making sure that people are prosecuted and examples are made of them as a deterrent,” he said.

“But that’s the politics of the day, unfortunately,” he added. “It seems that we’ve gone too easy on people who commit crimes.”