INS’ finest

Federal officials such as Danny Akaka, George Miller, Al Stayman, David North and Bruce Babbit all want to impose the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service upon the CNMI. They want to do this, in part, because they do not trust our own local immigration service. They apparently think that our local immigration service is incompetent, contaminated and corrupt, while their own venerable INS remains clean, competent and well above reproach–at least compared to our own local government. After all, it was Al Stayman who openly declared that our own Department of Labor and Immigration basically amounted to “organized crime.” (And for his keen diplomacy, Stayman was eventually promoted to a senior post in the US State Department.)

An April 4, 2000 article in the San Antonio Express-News, however, casts this basic assumption into serious doubt. The U.S. Immigration Service is evidently not what Akaka et al. have portrayed it to be: a paragon of state virtue. For according to this news story, homosexual harassment was allegedly tolerated at “an elite US
Border Patrol intelligence unit” in Laredo, Texas.

As the news report attests, a senior male INS agent allegedly routinely harassed his male subordinates in a flagrantly homosexual fashion. He reportedly leered at some of his men. He reportedly groped them on numerous occasions. He reportedly slid a ruler beneath one INS agent’s legs. He reportedly made numerous sexual innuendoes and advances.

Eventually, the alleged male targets of this homosexual behavior filed a civil lawsuit against the INS, demanding millions in compensation, stating that they were passed up for promotions because of their alleged failure to fully submit to such homosexual harassment. The civil suit was also allegedly buttressed by an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint.

Meanwhile, the senior INS agent who perpetrated these heinous unwanted homosexual advances was allegedly fired–and then curiously rehired.

Guess where this senior INS agent was reportedly re-assigned, as punishment for his alleged acts? Why, Saipan, of course–“a remote ‘South Pacific’ post.”

Now these are very serious allegations; and if they are true, then they certainly warrant much further investigation. Did the US government actually send us an INS reject? And what harm could such an unstable character do to our islands? Might he continue to abuse his INS authority in order to advance his aggressive homosexual harassment?

Call the INS office in Saipan (233-0788) and inquire about the facts. Is there an Oscar Martinez manning the INS office here? Ask him if he knows anything about it. Ask him if the reports, as vile and despicable as they may be, are actually true. Ask him if he is the man mentioned in the San Antonio Express News.

Danny Akaka and company need to know about this possibly very deplorable INS situation. The CNMI deserves the best.