ICE agents arrest 17 in effort to rid area of street gangs
By Ryan Mills

Saturday, November 18, 2006

The arrest of 17 gang members and criminal aliens this week is just the beginning of an ongoing effort by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to rid Southwest Florida of foreign national criminals who pose a threat to residents, authorities said Friday.

As part of Operation Community Shield, ICE agents nationwide are teaming with state and local law enforcers to identify violent gangs, gather intelligence on them, disrupt their operations and criminally prosecute the gang members.

“We’re not going to cease in our effort while there are people out there who want to terrorize our community,” ICE spokeswoman Barbara Gonzalez said. “We’re going to be looking for them and will use all of our tools and our authorities under the law to arrest them and remove them.”

On Wednesday night, ICE special agents teamed with members of the Collier County Sheriff’s Office’s street gang unit to arrest 13 gang members and four immigration violators with aggravated felony convictions, authorities said. A hold was put on an 18th man who already was in jail.

All of the people arrested are men and most are in the country illegally, said Sgt. Ron Byington of the street gang unit.

“Some of them were here under legal guidelines,” Byington said. “But their activities prompted them to be considered illegal aliens.”

The arrests occurred in various locations throughout Collier County, authorities said. Of the 17 arrested, seven were Haitian, eight were Mexican, one was Bolivian and one was El Salvadoran.

Officials wouldn’t discuss the tactics they used to make the arrests, but said that all of the arrests were based on intelligence and careful planning.

“We do not do random arrests,” Gonzalez said. “We have identified gangs (in Collier County) and for that reason we’re moving forward to arrest those that are a threat.”

Among the men arrested was Charles Joseph, a 29-year-old citizen of Haiti, who is a documented street gang member with multiple drug convictions and a conviction for carrying a concealed weapon.

ICE agents also put a hold on 40-year-old Gilberto Rogel-Gomez, a Mexican predator convicted of lewd and lascivious molestation of a 6-year-old. Rogel-Gomez has been in the Collier County jail since December 2003, said Kristin Adams, a spokeswoman for the Sheriff’s Office.

Jacques Sinjuste, director of the Collier County-based Jerusalem Haitian Community Center and a leader in Collier County’s immigrant community, said he was aware of the arrests and supports the work of the ICE agents “100 percent.”

He said he tries to work with law enforcement to identify gang members in the Haitian community.

“If they are really gang members, they deserve to go back home,” Sinjuste said. “If I could catch them myself, I would put them in jail myself. We do not tolerate gang members and drug dealers. We don’t have a place for them here.”

Sinjuste said gang members and criminals give honest, hard-working immigrants a bad name.

“It’s only a few people that are in the gangs, but the whole population of Haitians are not gang members,” he said. “When you deal with a gang, everybody can be a victim. They have no mercy for any group, white or black or whatever you are.”

Operation Community Shield was launched nationally by ICE in February 2005 to dismantle violent street gangs with foreign-born members, Gonzalez said. More than 2,300 street gang members representing 239 gangs have been arrested since the operation was launched, ICE reported.

“The law-abiding citizens of Collier County should sleep a little better tonight knowing there are 17 less people who could harm them,” Gonzalez said.

The other men arrested Wednesday were identified Friday by the Sheriff’s Office as: Kerby Alceus, 33; Juan Ayala, 28; Eric Banzer, 24; Jose Bustamante, 26; Frantz Dorvil, 32; Daniel Douyon, 23; Charlie Durantes, 24; Akish Hyppolite, 21; Billy Jacques, 21; Sallyifort L’Hommeus, 31; Abel Orguna, 29; Pegui Pacouloute, 24; Jose L. Perez-Lopez, 22; Cristobal Pulido, 43; Jorge Resendiz-Tamayo, 24; and Hector Vellegas, 29.

All 17 arrested men are being held at the Krome Detention Center in Miami and will go before an immigration judge who could order they be deported, Gonzalez said.

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