ICE arrests 30 in North Alabama
ICE arrests 30 in North Alabama
By: Renata Di Gregorio
Posted: Aug 29, 2018 09:27 PM CDT
Updated: Aug 29, 2018 09:53 PM CDT
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. - About 30 people are behind bars in North Alabama after multiple ICE raids.
Immigration advocates say the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers are changing their tactics. The undocumented immigrants who are arrested in North Alabama are taken to DeKalb County and then to Louisiana.
The raids in Huntsville have apparently been around Drake Avenue and Patton Road and they haven't been arresting a lot of people all at once.
After listening to multiple accounts of arrests from Decatur to Huntsville since this weekend, officials with the Alabama Coalition for Immigrant Justice made a video Wednesday.
They felt it necessary to remind people of their rights now that ICE officers are approaching people differently.
"Typically in the past with the past administration, ICE would come with a warrant for a person who had committed a crime," explained Yalitza LaFontaine with the ACIJ.
"What we're discovering now is it's more open. I was just talking to a woman this morning whose husband was just getting gas."
WZDX News caught up with LaFontaine via a video call while she was in Birmingham making the video. She says there's a lot of confusion about the process once someone gets picked up by ICE.
She reminds people to not incriminate themselves and to have an emergency plan, especially when it comes to children.
"What happens to the children?" LaFontaine said. "What happens to your car, your property that you have?"
WZDX News spoke with a woman whose loved one was arrested. She wants to remain anonymous, but wants her story to reach others so that they prepare for anything for the sake of their kids.
"Me and our kids, we want him home because we've been suffering a lot without him," she said. "Like emotionally and financially because he is the breadwinner in our house."
She reminds people that they have the right to a bond hearing.
The ICE communications director for this region says the arrests were made by officers regularly assigned to the area. He says they conduct targeted enforcement actions as part of their daily duties.
https://www.rocketcitynow.com/news/i...ama/1405771775
