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In a cell at a New Jersey detention center, Miguel Feliz awaits what he fears will be his fate.

If the government
succeeds in deporting him to his homeland, the Dominican Republic, he believes he is as good as dead.
His only hope, he said, was to compel government officials to remember what he did for them, and honor their
word.
Mr. Feliz, 50, has led a complicated life. He worked in law enforcement in the Dominican Republic, but
switched allegiances in New York. He joined a Dominican gang, trafficking crack cocaine and helping to carry out
contract murders on the streets of Harlem.
But after his arrest, he became an extraordinary government witness, pleading guilty, helping the authorities
solve about 30 homicides, some of which he had been involved in; testifying in three trials; and providing what one
Federal Bureau of Investigation agent called the most stunning cooperation Ive seen.
Federal law enforcement authorities assured Mr. Feliz that they would do all they could to keep him from
being sent back to the Dominican Republic after he completed his sentence, including seeking a special S visa,
known colloquially as a snitch visa, that could allow him to stay in the United States.
My instinct is, if he goes back, he will be likely killed, the F.B.I. agent, Brian ORourke, testified at an
immigration hearing.
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Mr. Feliz even won the support of the federal judge in his case, who wrote last year to prosecutors in
Manhattan, asking why nothing more is being done to help this valuable witness.
Mr. Feliz, who completed his sentence more than three years ago, was recently transferred into immigration
custody at the Bergen County Jail in North Jersey, and told he could be deported at any time, he said. The F.B.I.
requested that the deportation be deferred, but the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, rejected it in
June.
How do I explain it? Mr. Feliz said in a recent interview from jail. I fulfilled my part of the agreement, my
part of the collaboration, in every sense.
He added, The government did not do the right thing in my case.
The debate over his fate, occurring almost entirely out of public view, highlights a rare but difficult situation
for criminal justice officials: how to handle criminals who seek protection against deportation after having provided
significant cooperation to the government.
Mr. Feliz began his career as a police officer and sergeant in the Dominican Republic, investigating counterfeit
money and fraudulent credit cards. Around 1990, while still in his 20s, he resigned and decided to go to New York
to meet another Dominican, Jose Erbo, who ran the drug gang in Harlem.
Using Mr. Erbos connections, Mr. Feliz has testified, he was smuggled in the trunk of a car across the Texas
border and flown to New York. He first worked for Mr. Erbo, counting the proceeds of his drug sales, and rose to
become Mr. Erbos second-in-command and confidant, prosecutors have said.
Mr. Erbos gang ran a cocaine factory and distribution network, torturing and killing rival drug dealers and
even taking murder contracts from other gangs, according to the authorities. The gang typically used hit men who
rode up to their targets on motorcycles, and was responsible for about 70 killings, including of government
informers, the authorities have said.
Mr. Feliz, in trial testimony and in the interview, did not minimize his culpability. He has testified that he was
the triggerman in one killing, and assisted in about a dozen others.
After his arrest in 1998, Mr. Feliz decided to switch sides. He said he was told that others were informing on
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him and that he faced a long prison sentence. He also thought about his family.
The only way that I can save a tiny piece of my life is by accepting this collaboration that the government is
offering me, he recalled in the interview.
His cooperation led to the indictments of Mr. Erbo and three of his associates. The associates pleaded guilty
and received lengthy prison sentences, while Mr. Erbo, who had fled to the Dominican Republic, was extradited,
tried and convicted in 2002 of being involved in nine murders and other crimes. The judge, Harold Baer Jr.,
imposed six consecutive life sentences plus 45 years.
Ninety percent of that case was Miguel Feliz, recalled Bennett Capers, one of the prosecutors and now a
professor at Brooklyn Law School. He was so valuable because he had rare inside information that would have
been impossible to get but for somebody so high up in the organization.
In March 2007, Mr. Feliz, who had been jailed throughout his cooperation, appeared for sentencing. A
prosecutor, Helen V. Cantwell, asked Judge Baer for leniency for Mr. Feliz, who faced a life sentence.
The government understands that the court cannot and should not ignore the breadth and depravity of
Felizs crimes, she wrote. This heinous record, however, must be balanced in some way by the number of
murderers brought to justice as a result of Felizs cooperation.
Tell me something, Judge Baer addressed Ms. Cantwell in court, asking, On a scale of 1 to 5 with 5 being
the most important, as well as the most candid, cooperator where would you put Mr. Feliz?
I put him at 5, she replied.
Mr. Feliz was sentenced to 15 years; with credit for good behavior, he was to have completed his term in 2011.
During the hearing, Judge Baer asked Ms. Cantwell about protection for Mr. Feliz. She said the government
would look at the witness protection program or at getting Mr. Feliz the S visa so he could stay in the country.
Mr. Feliz rejected witness protection because he said it would have made access to his two children difficult.
He said prosecutors then said they would help him obtain the S visa, which federal law allows for informers who
supply critical and reliable information in criminal or terrorist investigations.
James Cerven, a now-retired police detective sergeant involved in the case, recalled telling Mr. Feliz that he
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and other members of the investigative team would do everything in their power to speak to whoever we need to
speak to to help him get the visa. We werent doing this to be nice, Mr. Cerven added. Were doing this to be
fair.
Indeed, documents suggest that F.B.I. agents, detectives and prosecutors worked for years toward obtaining
the visa for Mr. Feliz. At a 2009 immigration hearing, for example, a lawyer for the Department of Homeland
Security said that in discussing the case with the United States attorneys office, they made clear they were
definitely planning on going on with the S visa.
As early as 2008, Mr. Feliz wrote to Judge Baer, saying an immigration officer had told him that upon
completion of his sentence, he would be deported to the Dominican Republic.
I will surely be killed once I arrive, Mr. Feliz wrote, citing the families of the victims and people whom I
testified against.
Judge Baer, in a note to prosecutors, wrote: Please see if you can do something for this fellow. He certainly
cooperated and testified.
Nonetheless, Mr. Feliz was ordered deported by an immigration judge in November 2010, an Immigration and
Customs Enforcement spokesman said, adding that since then, the agency has no record of receiving an application
for an S visa for Mr. Feliz.
A former federal prosecutor, Eric Snyder, said not every informer was an ideal candidate for an S visa. Hes
going to be living openly in society, in someones neighborhood, Mr. Snyder said, emphasizing that he had no
involvement in the Feliz case and was speaking generally. Hes still the same person who murdered 15 people.
Mr. Feliz began writing more frequently to the judge, recounting his cooperation and fears and noting that he
had been placed in a special unit to protect him from another Dominican gang, the Trinitarios, after word got out
about his role.
In subsequent correspondence, a prosecutor, Todd Blanche, expressed optimism to Judge Baer that Mr. Feliz
would get an S visa; a follow-up note, however, cautioned that because of Mr. Felizs violent background, the
decision-making process has taken significant time.
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In late December, Judge Baer wrote directly to Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern
District of New York.
I know the Department of Homeland Security is not the fastest gun in the West, Judge Baer said in his letter,
but it does seem to me that you or I should be trying to resolve Mr. Felizs predicament. He added, Maybe you
can try your hand.
In March, Mr. Blanche wrote to Judge Baers clerk, suggesting the issue would be resolved soon, hopefully
with Mr. Feliz getting a visa and being released. But no visa was obtained. In late May, Mr. Feliz lost a major
advocate when Judge Baer, 81, died of complications from a fall at his home in Fire Island Pines, N.Y.
For Mr. Feliz, the uncertainty persists. In prison, he said, he has taken courses in English and other subjects.
What I have to do is try to make a life, he said. The bad has passed. I know that I did bad things. I paid for that.
Im a different person.
A United States attorneys office spokesman said last week that prosecutors and their law enforcement
partners continue to work together with ICE and are hopeful that Mr. Feliz can still be granted an S visa.
He added, That process is continuing.
An immigration spokesman said Mr. Feliz was still facing deportation.
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