PA - Immigration agents flood Allison Hill in Harrisburg: 'Families have been broken
Immigration agents flood Allison Hill in Harrisburg: 'Families have been broken up'
By Christine Vendel
on March 10, 2017 at 10:07 AM, updated March 10, 2017 at 4:33 PM
HARRISBURG -- Immigration agents have been rounding up undocumented immigrants in Harrisburg's Allison Hill neighborhood, causing panic among the Hispanic population and sending some residents into hiding.
Harrisburg police and Hispanic leaders confirmed that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have been descending on Allison Hill in recent weeks looking for undocumented immigrants with criminal histories.
But when the agents come across other residents without proper documentation, they reportedly are being detained as well, said police Capt. Gabriel Olivera.
The ICE agents do not partner with police or notify police of their raids, Olivera said. Instead, police learned about the series of daily raids, some starting as early as 5 a.m., from residents.
"Several people have been taken into custody," Olivera said of what he had heard about the raids. "Families have been broken up."
An organization, Movement of Immigrant Leaders in Pennsylvania, or MILPA, is planning a 6 p.m. news conference Monday about the raids, said Harrisburg City Councilwoman Shamaine Daniels. The event will be at the St. Francis Assisi Church in Harrisburg.
The raids have caused such fear in certain pockets of Allison Hill that some residents reportedly are afraid to go to the corner store, Olivera said.
Some parents are reluctant to drop their children off at school for fear of getting stopped, said Daniels, who is an immigration attorney. Instead, the children are missing classes.
"It's really bad," Daniels said. "They don't just stop the person they're looking for. They hassle everyone who's around."
Olivera said he's received more than a dozen calls about raids. He said some businesses are reportedly considering closing temporarily because their primarily Hispanic clientele or workforce are afraid to leave their homes.
Gloria Vazquez Merrick, executive director of the Latino Hispanic American Community Center, was on a conference call Friday morning and unavailable to talk in detail but she confirmed that they were aware of numerous raids in recent weeks.
Daniels said they don't know how many people have been detained at this point.
"I have been canvassing across the city and people are really afraid," she said. "I'm even getting inquiries from people in Hershey about whether it's safe to come into the city. ICE is rough when they come in."
It can cause problem, Daniels said, because the handling of the local population by immigration agents may translate into less trust for local police.
"A lot of people don't understand the difference between the federal agents and local police," Daniels said. "We don't want our residents to stop talking to our local police when our department isn't involved in this."
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