Thread: Local pols: ICE not responding to most illegal immigrant ref

Local pols: ICE not responding to most illegal immigrant referrals

By Brandon Johansson
The Aurora Sentinel

It's been more than two years since state lawmakers convened in a special legislative session and passed a host of bills aimed at tackling illegal immigration on the local and state level.

But now, in the wake of two high-profile arrests in Aurora of suspected illegal immigrants with lengthy criminal records, more questions are being raised about what role local law enforcement should play in immigration matters. In both of the Aurora cases, police say they referred the men to federal authorities after previous arrests. But in each case, the men were back on Aurora streets within months.

And, some politicians say, the two Aurora cases illustrate something that has been clear to them for months: No matter how often local police refer suspected illegal immigrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, if there isn't adequate federal response, the efforts of local cops will be for naught.

"Local law enforcement has a mandate to report (suspected illegal immigrants,) but there is no corresponding mandate for ICE to respond," said State Rep. Morgan Carroll, D-Aurora.

In the wake of the two Aurora cases - one in which police say a suspected illegal immigrant caused a crash that killed three people, another in which police say a suspected illegal immigrant returned to Aurora after being deported and tried to kill a man - lawmakers, including Carroll, called for investigations into the way the state deals with illegal immigrants.

Gov. Bill Ritter on Sept. 11 asked Colorado Department of Public Safety Executive Director Peter Weir to conduct a thorough review of the system.

Ritter said the two cases "tragically highlight the need to constantly review gaps and make changes to close them.

"Immigration enforcement is ultimately the responsibility of the federal government," Ritter said. "And clearly, Washington has failed to fix a broken system. But at the local and state levels where we are on the front lines, we have a responsibility to identify and help solve problems.

Legislators with the Audit Committee said Tuesday they will research what the investigation would entail before they decide in November whether to conduct it.

State Auditor Sally Symanski said some of the challenges to consider before conducting an audit is how to collect data from the local law enforcement agencies because they don't always share arrest information with each other.

Ritter asked that the audit be complete by the end of the year, making its findings available before the state Legislature reconvenes in January.

According to some estimates, Aurora police contacted ICE 2,500 times in 2007 about a suspected illegal immigrant police contacted. But ICE responded to the department less than 1 percent of the time, according to estimates.

In the case of Francis Hernandez, a Guatemalan national who is accused of causing a triple fatal crash early this month, Aurora police said they referred him to ICE in April after arresting him in a separate case, but ICE never picked him up. ICE has denied that claim, saying they can't find any record of Aurora police or the Arapahoe County Jail contacting them about Hernandez before this month's crash.

Federal authorities say they respond to as many reports of suspected illegal immigrants as they can, though ICE refused to disclose how often they respond when contacted by a local law enforcement agency.

The agency also refused to say how many agents work out of its Denver office, which is responsible for cases in Colorado and Wyoming, citing security concerns.

Aurora police declined to confirm or deny the one percent figure cited by area politicians. Detective Bob Friel, a spokesman for the department, said police are working to compile an exact figure but are not discussing the figures until they meet with ICE and other agencies as part of the review Gov. Ritter called for.

T.Q. Houlton, a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, said illegal immigration is an issue that needs to be tackled on the federal and local level.

Tancredo, R-Littleton, has long been a vocal opponent of illegal immigration and after the Hernandez case broke, laid much of the blame for the case at the feet of Ritter and Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, who Tancredo accused of supporting "sanctuary" policies that stop local police from cooperating with federal authorities on immigration matters. Hickenlooper and Ritter denied the charges.

Houlton said one of the solution to illegal immigration is for local officials to encourage their police to cooperate with federal authorities.

But, he said, the federal government also needs to address resource issues with ICE.

"There are definite issues with resources with ICE," he said.

Houlton said he doesn't expect Congress to tackle the issue of illegal immigration or funding for ICE anytime soon, especially with a presidential campaign underway.

"Especially with both presidential candidates wanting to ignore the issue before the elections," he said.

Carroll, who is running for a state senate seat, said she expects a bevy of immigration bills next session.

But, she said, if questions about the federal response aren't answered and if laws are not adequately enforced, more laws likely won't do much good.

"The danger of the legislature is to pass bills for bills' sake," she said. "Any time you have an intensely charged situation, you need to be measured to make sure what you're doing is act solving a problem."
http://www.aurorasentinel.com/main.asp? ... leID=20547

So when does the"need to be measured to make sure what you're doing is actually going to solve a problem" reach the point where it becomes a fact that you're just not doing your job? And maybe you're not the person for the job. Or does that point just never come?

ICE get busy!

There needs to be a state level response the ICE has limited resources for picking people up and the municipalities do not have the scale either. There should be a state contractor with a fleet of prison buses that drive to municipal jails picking up the deportees and taking them to ICE.