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Hazleton case is dropped

The mayor had cited a slaying in which two illegal immigrants were charged as a reason for a much-copied crackdown in his city.

ALLENTOWN - Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta has long cited the May 2006 shooting death of a 29-year-old city man as the impetus for his famous crackdown on illegal immigrants.

But yesterday, prosecutors dropped homicide charges against two illegal immigrants accused of shooting Derek Kichline.

Luzerne County prosecutors said they abandoned the case against Joan Romero and Pedro Cabrera because key witnesses were unavailable or unreliable, not because they were convinced of the men's innocence.

Barletta's critics quickly pointed to the decision as evidence that the mayor jumped to conclusions when he accused illegal immigrants of wrecking his northeastern Pennsylvania city of more than 30,000 people.

"This dismissal of charges adds to the long list of discredited claims Barletta has made in the course of demonizing undocumented immigrants for allegedly destroying Hazleton," said Witold J. Walczak, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania.

Barletta called Walczak's statement repulsive.

"Derek Kichline's family and friends will never see justice for his death," Barletta said. "The fact that the ACLU celebrates this and turns it into a public relations spectacle is disgusting, and Mr. Walczak should be ashamed of himself."

Barletta has cited other reasons in addition to the Kichline slaying for his high-profile campaign against illegal immigrants, saying they had been caught dealing drugs and committing other crimes and have overburdened police, schools and hospitals.

The city's Illegal Immigration Relief Act, approved by the City Council last summer and copied by towns and cities around the nation, would penalize landlords who rent to illegal immigrants and businesses that hire them. A companion ordinance would require tenants to register with City Hall and pay for a rental permit.

The ACLU has sued to overturn the measures, saying they trample on the federal government's exclusive power to regulate immigration. A federal judge is expected to rule on the constitutionality of the laws this summer.

The two men who had been charged in Kichline's slaying will continue to be jailed pending their deportation to the Dominican Republic.

"They will not be free to walk the streets of Luzerne County," Assistant District Attorney Mike Vough said yesterday.

He said the District Attorney's Office was forced to drop the case because a key witness, Cesar Ariel Jacquez, had inadvertently been deported, and two other important witnesses had credibility issues.