[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 2]
[House]
[Pages 2659-2660]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1630
        FOREIGN NATIONS SHOULD PAY FOR CRIMES OF THEIR CITIZENS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Cohen). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, a young 8-year-old-girl in Florida is 
kidnapped, raped and buried alive under a large concrete slab by an 
illegal.
  A decorated Houston police officer is shot in the back four times and 
murdered by an illegal. A Texas State trooper was shot six times at 
point-blank range and left for dead at the side of the road by an 
illegal.
  ``The Railroad Killer,'' a violent predator who terrorized, stalked, 
raped and murdered 12 victims along the Texas railroads, an illegal. 
One study indicates that there are nearly 240,000 illegals who are sex 
offenders in the United States. They commit a total of one million 
crimes. These illegals create millions of victims who seek treatment 
and aid because they are victims.
  The United States does a good job of taking care of crime victims. We 
have created crime compensation funds in States, programs that aid in 
the recovery and help with the cost of treatment, but the cost is paid 
by America.
  Many victims are never compensated, however, and spend their life in 
pain and even in poverty. So why should not the country of the illegal 
pay for this crime as well? Countries who encourage the criminals to 
invade the United States should be held just as responsible as illegal 
perpetrators.
  U.S. victims, Mr. Speaker, should be allowed to seek monetary 
compensation from the country the illegal came from. News sources 
report that a 2006 FBI report on undocumented illegals found that 95 
percent of the murder warrants in Los Angeles are for illegals; 83 
percent in Phoenix; 86 percent, Albuquerque. Seventy-five percent of 
those on the most-wanted lists in L.A., Phoenix and Albuquerque are 
illegals.
  A recent Department of Justice study concluded that criminal 
illegals, once arrested, are likely to be rearrested six more times for 
other crimes. They are preying on innocent victims in the United 
States, both citizens and legal immigrants. When they are caught, some 
of them even flee back to their country.
  These countries should be held liable for the crimes that their 
citizens commit. A victim of crime by an illegal should be entitled to 
receive damages from the country which encourages illegal entry into 
the United States. Many countries, such as Mexico, Brazil, El Salvador, 
encourage their citizens to illegally enter the United States. Because 
of that, these nations should be held financially responsible for the 
crimes of their citizens, and victims should be allowed to have a cause 
of action in American Federal courts against these nations.
  Now, we know many times that these nations probably will not pay for 
that compensation for whatever reason. They just do not pay. If that is 
the case, then the victims should be allowed to apply through the State 
Department Foreign Aid Fund that we give these nations, like Mexico, 
and then receive just compensation, the compensation that they were 
awarded in Federal court.

[[Page 2660]]

  Victims should not have to continue to pay for the crimes of 
illegals. Their nations must pay. Illegals and their nations should be 
accountable and held accountable for the failure by coming into the 
United States illegally.
  Americans seem to always pay for illegal entry; those days need to 
end, and this is one way where countries should pay for the crimes of 
their illegals by compensating American crime victims and citizens or 
people that are here legally from other nations.
  Mr. Speaker, that's just the way it is.

                          ____________________