Can the press help the UNNJ students?

We are calling on the press to hear the stories of the UNNJ students.  We have been receiving hundreds of calls in the past week. As we hear the story of the students and their versions of situation, it seems that there are a lot of flaws in this operation. Entrapment is the word that comes to mind – in Jacobson v. United States, 503 U.S. 540, 548 (1992). “Government agents may not originate a criminal design, implant in an innocent person’s mind the disposition to commit a criminal act, and then induce commission of the crime so that the Government may prosecute.” A valid entrapment defense has two related elements: (1) government inducement of the crime, and (2) the defendant’s lack of predisposition to engage in the criminal conduct – Mathews v. United States, 485 U.S. 58, 63 (1988). In UNNJ situation, many of the elements of the Jacobson and Mathews are present.

Moreover, we were dealing with an institution which under the federal law was operating legally including issuing valid student visas until it was shut down. This means it was a ‘legal impossibility’ to be violating the law if you just “attended” the school. The visas were genuinely issued and the students honestly believed they were compliant. It is scary precedence because if the same sting operation is applied to the DMV, whosoever applies for a license at this particular DMV can find themselves driving without a license because they violated traffic rules. Remember the school just like DMV is set up by the government.

There are many questions unanswered in the UNNJ situation. We have been dealing with situations where students are just receiving a deportation letters even though they have legitimately transferred to other schools. Others are still in custody. I think the government should not issue blanket deportation orders and ultimately to those who were victims, a U visa should be issued especially those who have been victims of the brokers. We hope the DHS and the government realizes that there are many flaws to this operation and will remedy to the situation. Many were just wrongfully “trapped”, See all the updates here https://bit.ly/unnj including student comments.

We call on the members on the press, civil rights and immigrants rights organizations to help.