USA: Green Card Holders Beware: ICE detains a Polish doctor and green-card holder who has lived in the U.S. for nearly 40 years

Niec received a temporary green card and, in 1989, became a lawful permanent resident. He grew up in Michigan, went to medical school, became a doctor, and raised a daughter and stepdaughter.

Niec, now 43, never fathomed that his legal status in the United States would become an issue. With a renewed green card, and nearly 40 years in the country, his Polish nationality was an afterthought for Niec, his sister told The Washington Post. He doesn’t even speak Polish.

But on Tuesday morning, immigration authorities arrested Niec at his home, just after he had sent his 12-year-old stepdaughter off to school. Niec, a physician specializing in internal medicine at Bronson Healthcare Group in Kalamazoo, Mich., has been detained in a county jail ever since, awaiting a bond hearing and possible deportation.

“It’s shocking,” said his sister, a corporate lawyer named Iwona Niec Villaire. “No one can really understand what happened here.”
According to his “notice to appear” from the Department of Homeland Security, Niec’s detention stems from two misdemeanor convictions from 26 years ago. In January 1992, Niec was convicted of malicious destruction of property under $100. In April of that year, he was convicted of receiving and concealing stolen property over $100 and a financial transaction device.

Because Niec was convicted of two crimes involving “moral turpitude,” stemming from two separate incidents, he is subject to removal, immigration authorities wrote in the notice to appear, citing the Immigration and Nationality Act.

Both of the offenses took place when he was a teenager.He associated himself “with some bad people” his sister said. The first of the incidents involved an altercation with a driver after a car crash, Niec’s sister said. He was one of multiple teenagers in the car at the time.

The second of those convictions was eventually expunged from his criminal record, his sister said, as part of a guilty plea through Michigan’s Holmes Youthful Trainee Act, a program intended to help young offenders avoid the stigma of a criminal conviction.

But even though the crime was scrubbed off his public record, it can still be used against him for removal from the country, his sister said.

 Read more: ICE detains a Polish doctor and green-card holder who has lived in the U.S. for nearly 40 years

Chomsky says US is world’s biggest terrorist - by Isabelle Kumar

Naom Chomsky is one of the superstars of the intellectual world; a prolific author and self-proclaimed anarchist, who, at the age of 86 still doesn’t seem to be slowing down. He still rails against a whole host of perceived injustices, with the West generally in his line of fire. Isabelle Kumar of Euronews interviewed him about terrorism, Cuba and the future of Europe.

"In the global scene we are racing towards a precipice which we are determined to fall over which will sharply reduce the prospects for decent survival.”

“There are actually two, one is environmental catastrophe which is imminent and we don’t have a lot of time to deal with it and we are going the wrong way, and the other has been around for 70 years, the threat of nuclear war, which is in fact increasing. If you look at the record it is a miracle we have survived.”

The human species has been around for maybe a 100,000 years and it is now facing a unique moment in its history. This species is now in a position where it will decide very soon, in the next few generations, whether the experiment in so-called intelligent life will proceed or are we determined to destroy it? I mean scientists overwhelmingly recognise that most of the fossil fuels have to be left in the ground if our grandchildren are going to have decent prospects. But the institutional structures of our society are pressuring to try to extract every drop. The effects, the human consequences, of the predicted effects of climate change in the not very distant future, are catastrophic and we are racing toward that precipice.”

“The United States is carrying out constant actions which are dangerous to Israel, very seriously. Namely supporting Israeli policy. For the last 40 years the greatest threat to Israel has been its own policies. If you look back 40 years, say to 1970, Israel was one of the most respected and admired countries in the world. There were lots of favorable attitudes to it. Now, it’s one of the most disliked and feared countries in the world. In the early 70s Israel made a decision. They had a choice and they made a decision to prefer expansion to security and that carries with it dangerous consequences. Consequences which were obvious at the time – I wrote about them and other people did – if you prefer expansion to security it is going to lead to internal degeneration, anger, opposition, isolation and possibly ultimate destruction. And by supporting those policies, the United States is contributing to the threats that Israel faces.”  

Read more: Chomsky says US is world’s biggest terrorist | euronews, the global conversation