The Virginian Pilot Rushes to the Defense of Lawbreaking. The Drunk Illegal Killer Story.

The death of two teen-age girls by a drunken illegal immigrant with a history of arrest and convictions for minor crimes is a palette for people who wish to paint their own picture.

Bill O’Reilly, who hosts the highest rated talk show on cable, has elevated these deaths and the issues they raise to a national level. State and local officials are busy attempting to shift the blame to someone - anyone - other than themselves.

The primary culprit is of course that 22 year-old Alfredo Ramos, an illegal immigrant from Mexico who was so drunk on the day he killed the girls that he can't remember hitting them. And his drunken driving was not an isolated incident. According to the Pilot, he has three drunken driving convictions during his 7 years in the US. This is a remarkable history since drunks are stopped and convicted for only a small fraction of the times they actually take to the road.

But this vehicular homicide has touched a nerve among the American people because there is a general unease with the fact that the country is overrun with illegal aliens. In general we are a law abiding people who believe in playing by the rules. And when the rules about immigration are flouted, and flouted blatantly and openly, people get upset. They get even more upset when community officials deliberately help the lawbreakers. And when those lawbreakers kill the most innocent among us, there will be hell to pay.

And rightly so.

The Virginian Pilot’s take? In what is supposed to be a news report, Deirdre Fernandes and Jon Frank present a defense of Virginia Beach officials who allowed – as a matter of policy – to allow Alfredo Ramos to remain in Virginia Beach until he finally kills two girls .

City leaders launched a counterattack against Fox News personality Bill O'Reilly on Thursday, calling him a "TV show gadfly" after he blamed the city in the deaths of two teenagers and accused local leaders of providing sanctuary to illegal immigrants.

A nice bit of name calling.

Major Meyera Oberndorf and the police chief, Jake Jacocks Jr. apparently have the support of one of the slain girls’ fathers.

Ray Tranchant, Tessa's father, urged people not to treat the tragedy like "a political football."

"There's been some politicizing and mudslinging against the city," Tranchant said in a quiet voice. He added that he trusts "justice will be done."

Tranchant has my sympathy as a parent. I would be heartbroken if my daughter was killed. Parents should not have to bury their children. As a father he has my support, but as someone who has injected himself into a political controversy he does not. And make no mistake about it; Bill O’Reilly did not create this controversy: city and state officials have.

City leaders tried to shift the debate about the recent deaths of Alison Kunhardt, 17, and Tessa Tranchant, 16, away from illegal immigration and onto drunk driving….

Police Chief Jake Jacocks Jr. said he found it "ironic that had the intoxicated driver been born and raised in Virginia Beach, little notice would have been given to this senseless tragedy by the media or the community at large.
"Unfortunately, most who have been outspoken about this recent and all-too-common tragedy have lost perspective and focus," he said.

Nice try on the part of Chief Jacocks to change the subject. “Ignore the man behind the curtain.”

We can’t deport people who were born and raised in Virginia Beach. We should be able to deport people who are here illegally and who have demonstrated – by repeated arrests – that they are a danger to the community. In fact, we should be able to deport people who are here illegally, period; full stop.

Why is Chief Jacocks so defensive? Well it appears that it is his policy that prevents his officers from asking about the status of illegal aliens:

O'Reilly was castigating a Virginia Beach policy that forbids patrol officers from asking the immigration status of defendants charged with misdemeanors.
Jacocks said the policy is similar to those used by other large cities and is necessary so that illegal immigrants will report crimes and help in the prosecution of crimes without fear of retribution from law enforcement.

Jacocks, along with his leadership command, crafted the policy and put it into practice in September 2005. "As chief of police, it is my policy," he said.

Note that Jacocks tries to subtly direct some of the blame for the policy to his “leadership command.”

And Poor old Meyera Oberndorf?

Oberndorf seemed almost bewildered by the criticism.

"Neither I nor any member of the council have adopted any legislation to make this a sanctuary city," she said.

She has rarely taken a stance on immigration locally, but as a participant in the U.S. conference of mayors, she has urged President Bush to reform the country's immigration policies and called the proposal to build the 300-mile fence along the Mexico border "un-American."

I’m sure she is bewildered. She believes that she is on the side of the angels. That her beliefs are the beliefs of all right-thinking people. That people who want illegal immigration to stop are knuckle dragging Neanderthals. That the illegals are “doing the jobs that Americans don’t want to do” That they are poor but honest, that they are blah, blah, blah.

As the old Viet Nam era song says, “you don’t need a weatherman” to figure out where Oberndorf stands on the issue of illegal immigration and what her position is regarding the deportation of illegal aliens.

But when called to account, she says that we never officially passed a law making Virginia Beach a “sanctuary city.” No, she, and the police chief made it a sanctuary city by way of a police rule.

And what about the State of Virginia in all this?

Kevin Hall, a spokesman for Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, said his office received about 20 telephone calls about the issue.

Hall said three callers referred to immigration proposals by Attorney General Bob McDonnell or bills on the topic that had been considered by the General Assembly this year but that most seemed to be generated solely by the television show.

"We're telling callers that immigration is a federal responsibility," Hall said. "We're already undermanned in the State Police and reluctant to order them to do the federal government's job."

Meanwhile the State has just passed a bill that will build more roads that will allow the next Alfredo Ramos to kill again. It seems that stopping him is nobody’s responsibility.