May 16, 2013
By Patrick Cassidy
capecodonline.com

HYANNIS - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials arrested five people for being in the country illegally during early morning raids Thursday in two Mid-Cape towns.

Although at least three of the people arrested are students from the same Central Asian country as the Boston Marathon terrorism suspects, the operation on Cape Cod was unrelated to the investigation into the marathon bombings, according to an ICE spokesman.

Starting at about 6:50 a.m. ICE officials, with assistance from the Barnstable police, went to three locations in Hyannis looking for illegal immigrants wanted on ICE warrants, according to Barnstable police.

The agency arrested Yuliya Gonzalez, 20, at 1037 Pitcher’s Way in Hyannis, Barnstable Police Chief Paul MacDonald said. Officers arrested Adilet Kadyrov, 20; Nursultan Kaiypov, 20; and Elbek Kalbekov, 24, at 35 Gosnold St., he said.

The agents went to another address on Brookshire Road but did not arrest anyone there, he said, adding that ICE also went to locations in Yarmouth.

The people detained in Hyannis were booked at the Barnstable police station and then taken to Boston for arraignment, MacDonald said.

Yarmouth police assisted ICE but no individuals were booked through the Yarmouth police station, Yarmouth Deputy Police Chief Steven Xiarhos said.

ICE spokesman Ross Feinstein said the agency arrested two people in Yarmouth and three people in Hyannis. Feinstein said he did not know why the local police tally of how many people were arrested was different from what ICE had in its records.

He said he could not release the names of the individuals because they were picked up on administrative immigration violations and not on criminal charges.

The arrests are not connected to the bombings at the Boston Marathon a month ago, Feinstein said.

“This is part of the normal course of operations we do on daily basis,” he said.

In an email Feinstein reiterated that the arrests were not connected to the bombings and that ICE continues to conduct nationwide operations, including in New England, targeting illegal immigrants.

The two brothers accused of setting off a pair of explosions at the marathon last month – Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev – once lived in Kyrgyzstan, the home country of the three people arrested at 35 Gosnold St., according to a Kenyan man who said he was their roommate.

Police arrived at the Gosnold Street home sometime between 6:30 and 7 a.m., the man said during a brief interview at the house. He declined to give his name.

About eight law enforcement officials were at the door when he answered, the man said.

“It was scary when you see the guns and the Tasers,” he said.

The three men whom the officers detained at the home are all students, the man said, adding that he did not know which college they attended.

When asked if they knew why the officers were there, his roommates said it was because their student visas had expired, the man said.

The man said he has his green card.

The officers checked the house but did not find anything illegal, he said, adding that he did not believe his roommates were involved in anything related to the Boston bombings.

Nobody answered the door at 1037 Pitcher’s Way, which has a nicely manicured lawn and other plantings around a deck. On the property behind the home are two campers and a chicken coop as well as various pieces of landscaping equipment.

A woman who works nearby said the home’s owner is very nice and she hasn’t heard anything out-of-the-ordinary besides recent squawking from the chickens.

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