Jul 30 2008
Immigration Raises Eyebrows in Alamance County
The News & Observer ran a story today about a 23 three year old librarian in Alamance County who was arrested by the Sheriff’s department for being here illegally. Sounds pretty cut and dry, right? Well, there’s a little more to it than that. Obviously you have the standard uproar from the bleeding hearts who find it tragic that law enforcement would actually enforce the laws against an illegal immigrant who has been here since she was a toddler and is a productive member of the community. Admittedly, I feel a little bad for her too being that she was brought here before she was old enough to speak, but there is a little more to it.
Marxavi Angel Martinez, the said illegal immigrant, was using a stolen Social Security number of a dead person. She may not have been able to do anything about her status as a child, but when she became an adult she could have begun to take responsibility for her situation. Even if the person is dead, she still engaged in identity theft and that is a criminal act, no matter how nice or hardworking she may be, so that’s where my sympathy ends.
The main crux of this arrest that is causing concern is how they figured out she was illegal. It’s alleged that the Sheriff’s office identified her status through public health department medical records. We are now getting into an issue of expected privacy and that is where the ethical dilemna comes into play. Was it ok for the Sheriff’s department to benefit from access to medical records to identify Martinez as an illegal immigrant or did they tread too far and cross the line into an expected area of personal privacy? I don’t know that I really have a problem with this. They received a tip regarding this woman resulting from a public health department investigation so it’s not like Sheriff’s deputies were sitting down digging through everyone’s medical records in Alamance County.
Others are concerned that this will discourage illegals from seeking health care, which I could care less about. That just means the taxpayers will save money by not having to foot the bill for these criminals getting their free E.R. care at our expense.
