Immigration and Crime: Myth and Reality

A recent report released by the Public Policy Institute of California demonstrates that the immigrant population of California, slightly more than one-third of the state's adult population make up only 17 per cent of the prison population. In fact, the report found that native-born Californian adult males are incarcerated at a rate of ten times that of foreign-born adult males. Further contradicting the scare tactics of those attempting to criminalize and demonize all immigrants, the report found that "on average, between 2000 and 2005, cities that had a higher share of recent immigrants saw their crime rates fall further than cities with a lower share. This finding is especially strong when it comes to violent crime."

One of the report's authors suggests that immigrants are less likely than native-born Californians to commit crimes because they are coming here for economic reasons, to find work and to increase their incomes. Commenting on the report, Salvatore Bustamante, director of a state-wide immigrant advocacy group stated that "A lot of people have painted immigrants as the criminal element in our society, and that isn't the case." He further explained that immigrants come to the US to find work and as a result stay "under the radar of authorities" and avoid criminal activity to prevent being deported.

The authors of the report conclude that the "findings suggest that spending additional dollars to reduce immigration or to increase enforcement against the foreign-born will not have a high return in terms of public safety. The foreign-born in California already have extremely low rates of criminal activity."

The full report titled:

Crime, Corrections, and California What Does Immigration Have to Do with It?

can be accessed at:
http://www.ppic.org/content/pubs/cacounts/CC_208KBCC.pdf