Pinal County rejects sheriff's demand for vote on special unit

by Lindsey Collom - Oct. 28, 2010 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic
.

A presentation to Pinal County supervisors on federal resources devoted to enforcing immigration and drug laws ended abruptly Wednesday when Sheriff Paul Babeu asked the board to take an impromptu vote on a proposed anti-smuggling unit.

County officials had asked representatives from the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice to attend the board meeting to speak about illegal immigration and drug smuggling in Pinal County. Chairman Pete Rios said he wanted the federal perspective on the issues when considering Babeu's proposal.


The sheriff has for months claimed increasing smuggling activity and associated violence in Pinal County.

Babeu most recently asked Pinal County supervisors for emergency funding to create seven new law-enforcement positions. The proposed Anti Smuggling Enforcement Unit, a team of one sergeant and six deputies, would be tasked with crime prevention and law enforcement involving illegal immigration and drug smuggling.

Babeu said incidents this week have underscored the need for a dedicated unit in Pinal: A cartel "snitch" was shot dead in his vehicle in Casa Grande and a suspected smuggler struck a state Department of Public Safety officer and used the patrol vehicle as a getaway car until his arrest off Interstate 10.

"I'm not saying this to be dramatic and turning this into a further political issue," Babeu told the supervisors. "I don't understand what this board doesn't understand about emergency. I'm asking the board to make a vote today, yes or no. We can't do this by ourselves and I do believe we have a responsibility to stand up."

On Wednesday, officials from U.S. Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona told supervisors immigration arrests are down, prosecutions are up and increased cooperation between agencies has helped.

Victor M. Manjarez Jr., chief patrol agent of the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector, said the numbers show that fewer illegal immigrants are crossing from Mexico into the U.S., from 616,000 arrests in 2000 to 212,000 arrests in the past year.

Also last year, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona prosecuted 3,200 felony and 22,000 misdemeanor illegal-immigration cases, said Joseph Koehler, assistant U.S. attorney. He said prosecutions this year will outpace last year's tally.

And Matthew Allen, special agent in charge of homeland-security investigations for ICE in Arizona, said state and local police are referring fewer people for deportation hearings. In three years' time, deportation referrals went from 7,000 to about 4,000, Allen said.

Why then, Supervisor David Snider asked, does it appear that Pinal County has been "swamped by a veritable tsunami" of undocumented people?

"Attention to this problem has risen significantly over the past few years," Koehler said. "Anecdotal reports, individual incidents are up rather significantly. When you look at the universe of things that come in and get reported, the stats are down. We hope that means we're achieving success."

Allen said factors contributing to the activity in Pinal are the convergence of major freeways, routes through the Tohono O'Odham Reservation that borders Pinal, and desert foot and vehicle trails.

But federal officials were hesitant to answer questions from supervisors as to whether smuggling trends in Pinal constituted an emergency or if an anti-smuggling unit could be helpful.

"We're not elected officials, we're not here to engage in a political debate," Koehler said. Supervisor Bryan Martyn said asking federal agencies to evaluate their own efforts "is like asking the foxes if the henhouse is secure."

Martyn echoed Babeu's call for a vote on the proposal. But Deputy County Attorney Chris Roll said the supervisors would violate the state Open Meeting Law if they voted on the anti-smuggling unit, which was not on the agenda.

Rios said the board would likely make a decision on the unit in the next few weeks.

"Is there an emergency?" he said. "I don't know - I guess it depends on who you ask. If the sheriff really believes there's an emergency, he would add additional deputies" to patrol affected areas.



Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/community/pina ... z13hel6UMc