New Fifth Circuit Judge: Senate Confirms Dallasite Catharina Haynes

As the Houston Chronicle reports here, the Senate yesterday approved the nomination of Catharina Haynes to serve on the Fifth Circuit. Judge Haynes has previously served on the 191st District Court of Dallas County, and also worked in private practice at Thompson & Knight and Baker Botts.

Link via How Appealing.

More News On Operation Streamline

The Dallas Morning News reports here on the commencement of Operation Streamline in Laredo. The story covers much of the same ground as the articles mentioned here, but it's still worth a look-see.

Also, the Arizona Republic reports that Operation Streamline, which has been in effect in the Yuma sector for a while now, may be expanded to the rest of Arizona. There's a substantial Fifth Circuit angle, though, because most of the article is about how Operation Streamline has been going in Del Rio.

Links via Bender's Immigration Bulletin - Daily Edition.

Operation Streamline Coming to Laredo

The Houston Chronicle reports here that

The U.S. Border Patrol plans to announce today a "zero tolerance" operation to prosecute, jail and deport all illegal immigrants caught in the bustling Laredo area, marking a significant tightening of immigration enforcement along a key U.S. border corridor.

This stepped-up effort is an expansion of the Border Patrol's "Operation Streamline" project in the Del Rio and Yuma, Ariz., sectors, which sharply reduced illegal entries. That is being expanded to the sprawling Laredo sector beginning Wednesday, officials confirmed.

As you might imagine, this will put an additional burden on courts that are already among the busiest in the nation.* As the San Antonio Express-News reported last week,

While prosecutors there couldn't be reached, judiciary spokesman Dick Corelli said the federal courts in Laredo already were inundated to the point that cases weren't being prosecuted.

"The federal courts are in a reactive mode here," Corelli said. "... The reaction is, 'Well, we'll handle any cases that come to the court in the best way we can.'"

The Express-News article also contained a chart showing that drug seizures increased dramatically at the same time that illegal alien apprehensions were falling in the Del Rio sector after the implementation of Operation Streamline. This related article in the Wall Street Journal explains that, "[a]s tighter security makes crossing the border trickier and more hazardous, the traditional mom-and-pop operations in Mexico that used to ferry people across have been replaced by larger, more-professional criminal gangs, often with ties to the illegal-drug trade."

*By the way, the Summer 2007 issue of the ABA magazine Litgation has a very interesting article by Judge Robert Gettleman, of the Northern District of Illinois, describing his experience as a visiting judge in Laredo. Unfortunately, you have to be an ABA member to access the article on-line, so you'll have to track down one of your ABA buddies if you want to read it. It's titled "Order on the Border," and is co-authored by Jenna Klatell, who was one of Judge Gettleman's clerks at the time.

A New Fifth Circuit Judge: Senate Confirms Mississippian Leslie Southwick

As reported at How Appealing, the Senate has consented to the appointment of Leslie Southwick to the Fifth Circuit. The White House press release announcing the nomination is available here. Judge Southwick is currently a visting professor at the Mississippi College School of law. He has previously served as a judge on the Mississippi Court of Appeals, as a JAG in the U.S. Army Reserves and the Mississippi National Guard, and as a Deputy Attorney General in the DOJ's Civil Division. Additional info about Judge Southwick's background is available in the White House press release.

UPDATE: How Appealing collects additional coverage here.