Arizona agency asks for federal help on immigration law (to help prepare officers)

[The Straight Story]

Arizona agency seeks federal help on immigration law

The Arizona agency tasked with training 15,000 law officers to enforce the state's controversial new illegal immigration law has asked federal authorities for assistance, but administration officials say it is unclear whether the government will help.

Lyle Mann, executive director of the Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board, says federal assistance is "critical" to what he describes as an unprecedented effort to prepare officers as soon as this summer to enforce the law, which gives local police authority to identify and arrest illegal immigrants.

"Participation by federal authorities is critical in ascertaining how to implement a standard of enforcement," says Mann, who made the request through the Department of Homeland Security's division of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

President Obama, however, has ordered a Justice Department review of the measure's civil rights implications.

"That review," DHS spokesman Matthew Chandler says, "will inform the government's actions."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-04-26-arizona-immigration_N.htm