Thread: Residents in N.M. town accuse sheriff of illegal raids

Residents in N.M. town accuse sheriff of illegal raids

Associated Press - September 28, 2007 12:35 PM ET

CHAPARRAL, N.M. (AP) - A controversy is brewing along the Texas-New Mexico border.

An illegal immigrant says an Otero County sheriff's deputy banged on her front door late one night, demanding to know who dialed 911. Startled, the woman said no one had. But she says the deputy insisted on searching the house without a warrant and questioned her and her relatives for nearly three hours before leaving. The woman says the next day, she was arrested in a traffic stop when she couldn't produce a Social Security card.

Otero County Undersheriff Norbert Sanchez says he finds it hard to believe that a deputy would spend three hours at a resident's house.

But residents of the county along the southern New Mexico border with Texas say their sheriff's department is routinely demanding proof of citizenship from residents, either in traffic stops or at their homes. More than a dozen people have been arrested and turned over to the U.S. Border Patrol since mid-August.

Other local police agencies, including the El Paso County Sheriff's Office in Texas, have been accused of using similar tactics in the past.

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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I don't care if they spend 10 hrs....undocumented need to freaking go home..
right on Sheriffs dept.....
heck... this is America...and I am sick of the whinning from lawbreakers