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38 found in Ontario drop house

Illegal immigrants' smugglers remain at large

By Brenda Gazzar, Staff Writer

Thirty-eight illegal immigrants recently smuggled into the country from Central America and Mexico were arrested on Aug. 10 at an Ontario "drop house" and placed into deportation proceedings, federal officials said Wednesday.

Ontario Police responded to an afternoon call about suspicious subjects and possible trespassing at a house on the I2100 block of South Cherry Avenue in South Ontario, Ontario Police Det. Diane Galindo said. Police officials interviewed the subjects about their immigration status, and then called federal immigration officials to handle the case.

"It's another example of how egregious smuggling is, to be finding all of these people in one house," said Lori Haley, a Laguna Niguel-based spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Drop houses are transition points for smuggled migrants and immigrants, who are then moved on to other cities where relatives or friends pay the balance of their smuggling fee. Often people are held in these houses against their will in poor conditions, Haley said.

The immigration agency, the largest investigative arm of the Department of Homeland Security, has not yet identified the group's smugglers but the matter is under investigation, Haley said. Often smugglers are not identified by their clients because they are afraid, she added.

Several women, a couple of minors, and three individuals who had previously been deported were among those arrested.

When special agents arrived, they found a house with one bed, a kitchen table and no other furniture. The foreigners, who had been smuggled across the border within two or three days before, were sitting around the floor.

Smugglers' notebooks found on the table recorded information, such as fees paid thus far, for each person.

Immigration officials said the house, which had running water and some food, was unsanitary. No drugs or weapons were found in the house.

Once the people in the house were identified, they were moved to ICE's offices in San Bernardino to be processed, and were either voluntarily deported or placed in immigration proceedings.

A similar number of undocumented people were found and arrested in a drop house in Corona by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is charged with enforcing immigration laws in the country's interior, in late 2004, Haley said.

"We've seen more people than you've ever imagined crammed into less space than you ever imagined," she said. "Smugglers don't care about the welfare of people they are smuggling or holding."