Thread: CO-Swift ICE raid: 3 years later

Swift ICE raid: 3 years later
posted by Dan Boniface Adam Chodak 13 hrs ago

GREELEY - Ernesto Garcia can't shake the memory. "It was bad," he says in Spanish as he describes the morning of Dec. 12, 2006.



That is the day when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided the meatpacking plant in Greeley. Garcia was working inside at the time.

ICE targeted five other Swift & Co. plants in different cities that same morning. Agents arrested close to 1,300 illegal immigrants and charged them with identity theft.

In Greeley, ICE pulled out more than 260 workers. Garcia was one of them.

He - like most of the others - was charged with working under someone else's Social Security number. But unlike most of the others, Garcia stayed in Greeley.

Three years after the raid, almost all of the workers arrested have either been deported or left the country on their own.

Garcia and a handful of others remain. Garcia says he is sticking around to fight the federal charges. But that fight comes at a price.

"It's been horrible," said Ricardo Romero, a volunteer for Al Frente de Lucha, a charity in Greeley.

For the last three years, Romero and the charity have been providing the basics for the affected families who still live in Greeley.

"The dilemma they face is, you can't leave the jurisdiction of the court when you get out on bond and you can't work because you don't have no documentation," Romero said.

Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck acknowledges the bind these families find themselves in, but adds law enforcement is not to blame.

"The reality is that they were arrested and (many) deported because they committed a crime, the crime of identity theft while they were in this country," he said.

Romero counters saying, in this case, confronting the crime came at too great a cost.

"I think it has totally devastated Greeley's economy ... and hurt Greeley's image," he said.

Recently, United Food and Commercial Workers Union and Little Voice Productions - a Denver company - produced a documentary on the raid called "Swift Justice."

"I don't think it's ever good that Greeley or Weld County is in the national news or state news for something that's negative, but on the other hand, it has helped the understanding of the issue and if we're going to resolve this issue, one of the prerequisites is understanding," Buck said.

In response to the raid, JBS USA, which now owns the meatpacking plant in Greeley, changed its hiring policy. Having consulted former ICE officials, JBS claims it is now harder for illegal immigrants to get in the door.

But these changes do not impress either Romero or Buck. Both men are looking for their own version of real progress and neither has seen any movement in that direction.

"It's not going to be changed overnight and it's not going to be changed with a more stringent immigration policy," Romero said.

"If we had an appropriate federal policy, we wouldn't be deporting them and we wouldn't have this stress on our infrastructure and the stress on our community that we have," Buck said.

Garcia is also anxiously awaiting some resolution as he plods through the court system. He says his next hearing is scheduled for January of 2011.

After the raid, ICE announced plans to create an office in Greeley. That office is expected to open in the coming months.

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx? ... &catid=339

"If we had an appropriate federal policy, we wouldn't be deporting them and we wouldn't have this stress on our infrastructure and the stress on our community that we have," Buck said.

So anyone that sneaks in here should not be deported? So anyone that sneaks in here should not worry about violating our laws? Get a grip!
We have an appropriate federal policy that states you are not allowed to sneak in here. Comprende?

Garcia is also anxiously awaiting some resolution as he plods through the court system. He says his next hearing is scheduled for January of 2011.

2011! Why is it taking so long? This guy should have been gone already.

They all got away with it and here is who did their taxes!!!

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-181460-.html