Thread: FL: Agents targeted Hispanics, immigration lawyer contends

Agents targeted Hispanics, immigration lawyer contends
By DIANNA SMITH

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

WEST PALM BEACH — A local immigration attorney plans to speak publicly today about a recent complaint she filed, which accuses Immigration and Customs Enforcement of racial profiling.

Aileen Josephs and other immigration advocates will gather in front of city hall at 10 a.m. to share concerns that ICE agents targeted the Hispanic population on Broadway Street in West Palm Beach this month.


But Nicole Navas, ICE spokeswoman, said Tuesday: "It wasn't an ICE enforcement operation."

According to the complaint, the pastor of a church at 4305 Broadway St. said people ran into the library of his church the morning of July 16 as ICE agents drove down the street.

Josephs wrote that agents went into a laundromat at 4013 Broadway St. and detained two people, including a married man with three children.

The complaint stated that ICE agents returned to the same laundromat on July 17, frightening the community.

"The immigrants along that area are living in constant fear because ICE agents drive along this street on a daily basis interrogating and detaining people that look Hispanic," Josephs wrote in the complaint.

The complaint was filed with the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Department of Homeland Security.

Josephs said a West Palm Beach police car and officers were also spotted near the scene, but West Palm Beach Police Chief Delsa Bush said she isn't aware of any such incident.

When Bush learned of Josephs' concerns, she said ICE agents "assured us they are not in our city doing random raids."

www.palmbeachpost.com

Oh so now they are going to direct where ICE and the Police can and cannot go ?? I don't think so.

GO HOME and you can live in peace with a clear conscience.