Abstract

Detained immigrants awaiting deportation after criminal convictions have often complained that they are being subjected to double jeopardy since they've already served their sentences. But the truth is their treatment does not even rise to that level: double jeopardy implies being tried twice for the same crime. The immigrants have been tried only once __ and punished twice. The U.S. deports people to countries where they don't even speak the language, having left as young children. And back in Portugal, or Nigeria, or Haiti, or El Salvador, they are often stigmatized as "criminal deportees" __ sometimes, as in Jamaica, publicly and within days of their arrival. A deportee's "alien file" is literally handed from the ICE agent on board the plane to, for example, the security agent at the Lagos airport. Penal and punishment have etymological roots in pain as well as fine, which is the ending of an obligation. For asylum_seekers and established residents, deportation is often not an end at all, but the start of a new and ongoing punishment.