In Nashville, immigration sweeps deter crime victims from coming forward

Karina Fernandez, a Metro Nashville Police Department crisis counseling supervisor, said victims of crime have been reluctant to step forward since mass immigration sweeps in the city in May. (Photo: John Partipilo/Tennessee Lookout)

Counselors within the Metro Nashville Police Department’s Family Safety Center routinely reach out to crime victims to offer free counseling and support to navigate the criminal justice system.

But soon after mass immigration enforcement sweeps in Nashville during May, the department’s five bilingual counselors witnessed a drastic, and alarming, shift.

In April, just before the Tennessee Highway Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, jointly conducted immigration sweeps, 699 crime victims sought the counselors’ help

By July, the number had shrunk to 61. Hundreds more – victims of crime including robbery, domestic violence, sexual assault, aggravated assault and other crimes – refused or ignored efforts to reach them. Counselors typically see more victims, not fewer, during the summer months due to seasonal crime spikes.

“After the ICE raids, advocates have found it challenging to build rapport with victims during the initial call to offer services. You can clearly see the difference in their response before and after the raids,” said Karina Fernandez, police crisis counseling supervisor.

“Many victims now refuse services, and some clients who do show up for appointments have disclosed they are afraid.”

The Trump administration’s highly visible immigration crackdowns have created new barriers to criminal justice and community safety, city law enforcement officials say.

Prosecutors have shown up to court to find immigrant victims a no-show, jeopardizing their ability to hold perpetrators accountable.

Hundreds of other cases have come to a standstill since January as ICE picked up alleged perpetrators without legal status from the local jail before trial, a fact that prosecutors and victims often learned only after they showed up to a court hearing. 

Davidson County District Attorney Glenn Funk said the immigration crackdowns ultimately “make Nashville a more dangerous place to live.”

“If the defendant, the person who caused the harm, is a citizen and their victim is a noncitizen and is afraid to come to court, they can continue committing crimes with impunity,” he said.

“For the defendants who are immigrants, I do not want someone to make bond and get deported and then never face accountability,” he said.

For victims ‘ICE often overshadows their cases’

Reported crime in Nashville is down overall this year, according to police data.  

Dispatched calls coded for the most serious crimes – murder, sexual battery, robbery and aggravated assaults – are down 14.8% to date this year over last; vehicle crashes are down nearly 7%. All other calls to police are down nearly 10%.

While experts say it is too early for data to reliably convey whether there’s been a dip in crime in Nashville this year – or an increased reluctance to report it – Justin Martinez-Aranda, a victim witness coordinator in the D.A.’s office, said he sees increased distrust of law enforcement among the Spanish-speaking victims of domestic violence he helps through the judicial process. 

“I’m seeing people hesitant to report,” he said. “There’s fear victims themselves might have repercussions for having reported the crime in the first place and I’m seeing a lot of victims sometimes feeling as if ICE and the issues posed by someone having an immigration hold overshadows their cases.”

Martin-Aranda said that in the immediate aftermath of the Nashville immigration raids in early May he saw a “significant decline” in victims wanting to proceed and reluctance to come to court. 

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The District Attorney’s office does not track the reasons why domestic violence victims do not appear in court but instances in which prosecution cannot move forward with victims’ testimony poses continued safety risks, Funk said.

“We want to make sure the victim can be safe going forward and if the person who victimized them was never held accountable, that person can continue to harm,” Funk said. “There’s no deterrence. There’s no accountability. There’s no rehabilitation because the person avoided prosecution, all because the victim was too afraid to come to court.”

The district attorney’s office does not consider immigration in prosecuting cases – a message they stress to victims.

“We do not take immigration status into account when handling domestic violence cases. Our priority is to provide support to all victims and hold all offenders accountable,” Assistant District Attorney Christina Johnson, a leader in the D.A.’s Domestic Violence Division, said.

 One metric the district attorney’s office has tracked among immigrant victims shows a marked decline.

Immigrant victims of certain crimes who lack legal status are eligible under federal law to apply for visas as cooperating witnesses. Last year, the district attorney’s office certified 422 of the victim visas. Thus far this year, they have processed just 324. 

“My own opinion is because they are scared to come forward because we’re a law enforcement agency,” said April Foster, an economic crimes investigator and visa certifying official.

Other criminal prosecutions have come to an end because the alleged perpetrator was picked up by ICE. 

Since January, 433 inmates have been taken into custody immediately upon release from the county jail, according to data provided by the district attorney’s office. Inmates are typically released from jail when they post bond or agree to a plea deal.

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The majority of individuals taken from the Nashville jail by ICE — 324 — were facing misdemeanor charges.

The district attorney’s office has worked with ICE to return three individuals charged with violent crimes – homicide, rape and crimes against children. The individuals had been taken from jail to a Louisiana detention facility, but have since been brought back to Nashville to face charges.

Fernandez, the Nashville police crisis counseling supervisor, said victims are beginning to come forward more often since the May immigration raids but not at the previous levels.

Immigrant advocates say it is unsurprising to see immigrant crime victims reluctant to work with police and prosecutors and fear that a new federal presence in Memphis will further deter them from coming forward.

“What we know is when people are too afraid to come forward when they’re unsure what will happen is that it makes it unsafe for everybody,” said Judith Clerjeune, campaigns and advocacy director for the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition. 

Clerjeune noted the multi-agency effort underway in Memphis, including the National Guard is further sowing fear.

“It’s eroding any sort of trust or legitimacy our government needs to have,” she said.