The Tennessee Liberal

Today's New York Times features an article on the issues with Georgia "Operation Meth Merchant" sting - specifically the cultural and racial barriers that have developed from an sting that arrested Indians almost exclusively.

The piece provides a great rundown of the fact that many of the people arrested are highly insulated from the world around them - by language, culture and socioeconomic status.

But the case here is also complicated by culture. Prosecutors have had to drop charges against one defendant they misidentified, presuming that the Indian woman inside the store must be the same Indian woman whose name appeared on the registration for a van parked outside, and lawyers have gathered evidence arguing that another defendant is the wrong Patel.

Another key passage:

In some cases, the language barriers seem obvious - one videotape shows cold medicine stacked next to a sign saying, "Cheek your change befor you leave a counter." Investigators footnoted court papers to explain that the clue the informants dropped most often - that they were doing "a cook" - is a "common term" meth makers use. Lawyers argue that if the courts could not be expected to understand what this meant, neither could immigrants with a limited grasp of English.

"This is not even slang language like 'gonna,' 'wanna,' " said Malvika Patel, who spent three days in jail before being cleared this month. " 'Cook' is very clear; it means food." And in this context, she said, some of the items the government wants stores to monitor would not set off any alarms. "When I do barbecue, I have four families. I never have enough aluminum foil."

While the story does a fairly good job of hitting the key issues involved with this very embarrassing situation, it does get one huge fact wrong:

This corner of the state is still largely white; Indians began moving here about 10 years ago, buying hotels and then convenience stores, and some whites still say, mistakenly, that "Patel" means "hotel" in Hindi.

Indians have been in our area in large numbers for a LONG time. Many of my good friends are first generation citizens, born to parents who immigrated in the 60s and 70s. The wave of immigrants now running the mom-and-pop stores did come into the country more recently, but it's totally off-base to portray it as a new phenomenon.

The article asks good questions, though, and takes a strong, broad approach to the story. I have to ask the question: Where was the Times Free Press while this was being written? They have done stories on Operation Meth Merchant and one-day hard news about accusations of misidentification, but they have taken no time to examine the issue at all. It opens the door to an exploration of Chattanooga's Indian community, its different factions, and how they view what is happening. I'd imagine you'd get some different reactions from those who immigrated long ago than you might expect. Either way, the TFP dropped the ball here and got scooped by its erstwhile cousin on a story that they should have had, and the world got an interesting picture of Chattanooga and Northwest Georgia.