BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Immigrants convicted of crimes in Alabama are receiving significantly longer prison sentences than citizens convicted of similar offenses, raising fresh questions about bias and inequality in a state already under federal scrutiny for its overcrowded and violent prisons.
A new ProPublica investigation reviewed more than 100 Alabama court cases involving immigrants who are currently incarcerated and found that some received unusually harsh punishments even when they had fewer prior convictions than U.S. citizens. The cases were drawn from a list of 156 people in state prisons who self-identified as noncitizens, a group that makes up less than 1% of the state’s prison population but appears to face outsize penalties.
In one case, a Mexican immigrant who caused a fatal car crash received a 61-year sentence, longer than about 93% of sentences imposed on people convicted of similar crimes in Alabama. In another, Nigerian-born green card holder Okiemute Omatie was sentenced to 20 years in prison for setting fire to his jail mattress in Etowah County, while three U.S.-born inmates who later started fires in the same jail each received 10-year sentences, despite one of them having a more serious prior record.
ProPublica also revisited the case of 19-year-old Mexican immigrant Jorge Ruiz, who was convicted of murder after a fatal crash in Alabama and initially sentenced to 99 years in prison, a term later reduced to 50 years that still far exceeds other sentences in the county for deadly crashes. Prosecutors in Ruiz’s case have denied treating him differently because of his race or immigration status, but his lawyers argue his punishment is out of step with how similar cases involving citizens are handled.
Legal experts say the Alabama cases echo broader research showing that noncitizens across the country receive longer sentences than citizens even when charged with the same crimes and with similar criminal histories. Studies cited in the investigation indicate that judges and prosecutors may perceive noncitizen defendants as more dangerous or less deserving of leniency, a pattern critics describe as institutional discrimination layered on top of an already punitive system.
The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly held that noncitizens are entitled to the same constitutional protections as citizens in criminal prosecutions, including equal treatment during sentencing. Advocates say Alabama’s disparities clash with those principles and highlight how immigration status can informally function as an aggravating factor, even when it is not written into state law.
Recent political debates have threatened to deepen those divides. Alabama lawmakers this year considered, but ultimately rejected, a bill that would have automatically increased the severity of some crimes committed by undocumented immigrants. Similar measures in other states and a bill pending in Congress would add extra prison time for undocumented people convicted of felonies, creating, in the words of one scholar quoted by ProPublica, a blueprint for treating otherwise identical defendants differently solely because of citizenship.
The investigation lands as Alabama’s prison system remains in crisis, with about 20,800 people incarcerated in facilities designed for roughly 12,000 and a federal lawsuit alleging unconstitutional conditions still unresolved. Civil rights advocates say the combination of long sentences for immigrants, low parole grant rates and chronic overcrowding reflects a prison regime that is both harsh and deeply unequal, especially for people of color and those born outside the United States.