Criminal defense counsel should consider investigating the human rights situation in the client's country of origin. If the client may be persecuted or tortured if deported back, the criminal prosecutor or court may be more open to allowing a non-deportable plea bargain or granting post-conviction relief to eliminate a deportable prior conviction. Immigration counsel may already have investigated a claim under the political asylum, withholding of deportation, or Convention Against Torture immigration laws and may already have factual materials indicating the client's family members have been beaten or persecuted on account of race, religion, or other asylum characteristics. Note that for use in the criminal courts, a case can be made that deportation would be a disaster for the client even if the situation does not fit within the restrictions of these immigration law claims. One of the best books on the subject of asylum (although somewhat outdated) is D. ANKER, THE LAW OF ASYLUM IN THE UNITED STATES (3d ed. 1999), with 2002 Supplement. The Department of Justice has the State Department Country Reports, including general information on human rights abuses country by country, at usdoj.gov/eoir/ in the Virtual Law Library. An excellent resource for researching country conditions is maintained by the Univerisity of Washington School of Law Library at http://lib.law.washington.edu/ref/asylum.html#.