Immigration Judge: Salvadoran General Accused in Killings Should Be Deported

"An immigration judge has found that a former defense minister in El Salvador, a close ally of the United States during a civil war there in the 1980s, should be deported because of his involvement in a number of human rights violations, including the assassination of an archbishop and the massacre of more than 1,000 peasants.  The decision by the judge, Michael C. Horn of Immigration Court in Miami, against the former officer, Gen. José Guillermo García, was issued on Feb. 26 but only released on Friday after a Freedom of Information Act request by The New York Times. ... In an unusually expansive and scalding 66-page decision, Judge Horn wrote that “these atrocities formed part of General García’s deliberate military policy as minister of defense.”  He added that the general “fostered, and allowed to thrive, an institutional atmosphere in which the Salvadoran armed forces preyed upon defenseless civilians under the guise of fighting a war against communist subversives.”  Despite the ruling, General García’s deportation is not imminent, as a lengthy appeal is expected." - New York Times, Apr. 12, 2014.