Immigrants & Crime

The following are a list of resources about immigrants and crime.

2009

Just the Facts: County data confirms: undocumented immigrants are not major sources of crime

June 25, 2009 - Sutherland Institute

When combined with population trends, state-prisoner data suggests that undocumented immigrants coming to Utah obey the law once they are here. Looking at county-level data in Utah, of the 5,269 inmates in county jails, only 3.9 percent were identified as undocumented immigrants--nearly equal to the estimated undocumented proportion of the total state population in 2008 of four percent.

2008

Rethinking Crime and Immigration

March 19, 2008 - Robert J. Sampson in Contexts, Vol. 7, No. 1, American Sociological Association

Immigration—even if illegal—is associated with lower crime rates in most disadvantaged urban neighborhoods. Increasing immigration tracks with the broad reduction in crime the United States has witnessed since the 1990s.

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

February 25, 2008 - Public Policy Institute of California

Immigrants are far less likely than the average U.S. native to commit crime in California. Even among noncitizen men from Mexico ages 18-40 – a group disproportionately likely to have entered the United States illegally – the authors find very low rates of institutionalization.

Are Deportable Aliens A Unique Threat To Public Safety?

January 15, 2008 - Laura J. Hickman, Portland State University and Marika J Suttorp, RAND Corporation in Criminology & Public Policy

The results revealed no difference in the rearrest rate of deportable and nondeportable aliens in terms of its occurrence, frequency, or timing. The results lend no support to the ubiquitous assertion that deportable aliens are a unique threat to public safety.

2007

The Myth of Immigrant Criminality and the Paradox of Assimilation: Incarceration Rates among Native and Foreign-Born Men

February 26, 2007 - Ruben G. Rumbaut, Ph.D. and Walter A. Ewing, Ph.D. for the Immigration Policy Center

Data from the census and other sources show that for every ethnic group without exception, incarceration rates among young men are lowest for immigrants, even those who are the least educated.