Thread: FL - Alleged crimes minor, dozens of Collier immigrants face deportation under Trump

Alexi C. Cardona and Patrick Riley , Naples Daily News Published 6:36 p.m. ET April 15, 2017 | Updated 3 hours ago

MIAMI — Tucked away between a casino and a state prison at the eastern edge of the Everglades stands the Krome Detention Center, a beige building framed by 10-foot-tall fences topped with razor wire and accessible only through a security checkpoint manned by armed guards.

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center in South Florida takes in undocumented immigrants around the clock. Unless the immigrants are released on bond or transferred, Krome is their home until a judge rules they can stay in the U.S. or must be deported.

A group of Collier County detainees arrived Tuesday at Krome’s 39-acre campus, their belongings packed away in brown paper bags as they went through intake and medical screenings.

The group is part of a recent surge of undocumented immigrants from Collier County sent to Krome in the weeks since a Jan. 25 executive order issued by President Donald Trump. As promised, Trump issued tougher immigration enforcement priorities, defining a “removable alien” as an undocumented immigrant who has been charged with "any criminal offense," even if not convicted, or who has "committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense."

For undocumented immigrants in Collier County, a traffic offense is now enough to end up at Krome, where they face deportation, according to recent arrest records.

In the month after Trump's order, at least 35 people and as many as 48 arrested by Collier deputies were transferred to ICE, according to hundreds of arrest records and court documents reviewed by the Naples Daily News.

Three-fourths of those cases alleged only misdemeanor traffic offenses, such as driving with no valid license, driving with an expired license or driving with a suspended license, according to arrest records.

Only three were for alleged felonies, and charges in two of those cases were dropped, and reduced to a misdemeanor in the third, court records show.

Those arrests occurred at a time when the Collier County Sheriff's Office was transferring more detainees to federal immigration authorities.

From Jan. 1 to March 31, the Sheriff’s Office took 215 detainees to ICE, or more than two inmates a day, according to the office's records. That rate was almost twice that of 2016, when 447 detainees were transferred during the entire year, or more than one inmate a day.

The Collier Sheriff’s Office is one of two Florida law enforcement agencies that partners with ICE under a program known as 287(g). The program allows deputies, under federal supervision, to interrogate arrested immigrants about their status and take steps that may lead to their deportation.

The Collier jail holds undocumented immigrants for an indefinite period until ICE can take them into custody after they post bail or serve their sentence on state charges.

U.S. Rep. Francis Rooney, R-Fla., said he thinks the trend in Collier County is an indication Trump is making good on his promise to enforce immigration laws.

“We are a nation of laws. I’m for enforcing the law,” said Rooney, a first-term congressman from Naples

Some local immigration attorneys said they have seen a noticeable uptick in immigrants being sent to Krome or other detention facilities since Trump signed his order.

“Under the Obama administration, there was a prioritization of people without documentation," said Frank DiPlacido III, a criminal defense and immigration attorney based in Bonita Springs. "Obviously, violent criminals, gang members, drug traffickers — those types of people were at the top of the list."

Now there is no prioritization, DiPlacido said.

“Anybody who is here illegally is subject to being removed,” he said. “We’re seeing a lot of people that are arrested for no valid driver’s license, driving with an expired license, who don’t have any other criminal history being taken into ICE custody and sent to the Krome Detention Center.”

That was certainly true in Collier County for the month after Trump's order.

The Daily News found that at least 35 people arrested in Collier were transferred to ICE detention facilities, according to the agency's records, court documents, arrest reports or information from their lawyers. Most were men, and five were women. They ranged in age from 18 to 43, and 23 identified Mexico as their home country. Five were from Guatemala. The rest came from Honduras, Cuba, Costa Rica and El Salvador.

Of the 35, 14 were arrested and charged with not having a valid driver's license, including one person who also was charged with DUI; 14 were charged with driving on suspended, revoked or expired licenses; two with failure to appear in court; two with misdemeanor battery; one with petit theft and disorderly conduct; and another with loitering or prowling and resisting arrest without violence.

One of the 35 arrested was booked on a felony charge of burglary with assault or battery, but the charge was downgraded to a misdemeanor.

One misdemeanor traffic case involved a suspected gang member.

But other cases involved people who had no prior arrest records.

One was a mother of two who was pulled over just hours after Trump issued his executive order. A deputy checked her van’s license plate and realized its registered owner had an expired driver’s license.

Another was an Estero High School student who, deputies said, drove 95 mph in a 45 mph zone.

An additional 13 people arrested in Collier were transferred from the county jail, according to Sheriff's Office records, and likely handed over to immigration authorities, the Daily News found. But they do not appear in ICE's online detainee records. The ICE online records are purged frequently, do not identify all detainees and can make a search difficult if an exact match on a last name is not provided.

Of the 13 people arrested and reported as transferred from the county jail, all but one were listed as "illegal aliens" in arrest records, noting their status as undocumented immigrants. The status of one man was redacted; he provided only a passport from Honduras when deputies stopped him at a safety checkpoint, arrest reports state.

The 13 ranged in age from 21 to 48. Six listed their home country as Mexico, four as Guatemala, two as Honduras and one as Peru.

Nine were arrested on the misdemeanor offense of driving without a valid license, though some had prior arrests on similar charges.

Two were arrested for violating open-container laws, a county ordinance.

Two others were arrested on felony domestic violence charges, but those charges were dropped by prosecutors because there was insufficient evidence.

With the recent rise in detainees being sent to ICE, DiPlacido said an immigration court system that already has long backlogs could become even more overwhelmed. Some cases can take as long as six years to complete, he said.

“Even before the election, there was already a backlog of about half a million cases in the immigration court system,” DiPlacido said. “And that was always the thought behind the prioritization of cases: ‘Look we can’t deport everybody, so we need to start somewhere and we’re going to start with the really bad guys first.’ You know, and now that’s kind of been turned on its head.”

DiPlacido said he thinks Trump’s administration eventually will understand “they can’t put all 11 million (undocumented) people in immigration court and put them in removal proceedings.”

“I think they’re going to come face to face with reality at some point and realize that they may not be able to do the things that they want to do or things they promise they were going to do during the campaign,” he said. “We don’t have the resources for it.”

Krome’s 581 beds are almost always occupied. Overflow detainees often are sent to the Monroe County Jail or Glades County Detention Center, said Virlenys Palma, an immigration and criminal defense attorney who has cases in Collier and offices Fort Myers and in Miami.

“Everybody is getting detained,” Palma said. “Krome is getting very full. And they see the difference.”

Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, in Washington, D.C., said he thinks any backlog will be relieved by hiring more Border Patrol agents, placing judges in border detention centers and stopping the “catch and release” practice of freeing immigrants found illegally crossing the border.

“I don’t think the folks running the system will allow it to be overwhelmed,” von Spakovsky said. “As more and more resources are brought to bear, the problems will subside.”

He also thinks increased enforcement will continue to deter people from crossing the border into the United States. Von Spakovsky cited the administration's recent announcement that border crossings decreased 40 percent from January to February.

“He has made it clear that he’ll actually enforce our immigration laws,” von Spakovsky said of Trump. “There are a whole series of steps being followed to get the illegal immigration problem under control and also make sure we aren’t inadvertently allowing potential terrorists inside the country.”

Rooney agreed, saying Trump is taking necessary action to deal with immigration.

“We are a democracy," he said. "The laws have to be enforced, and if people don’t like the laws, they need to work to change them.”

http://www.naplesnews.com/story/news...ent/100074864/

Sounds great to me! Pull 'em over, round 'em up, haul 'em in, deport them the hell out of here.

For undocumented immigrants in Collier County, a traffic offense is now enough to end up at Krome, where they face deportation, according to recent arrest records.

Not just in Collier County, that is nationwide.

ENFORCE AND DEPORT!

ENFORCE AND DEPORT!

ENFORCE AND DEPORT!

Load up the buses and send them right back over the border!

Originally Posted by Judy

Sounds great to me! Pull 'em over, round 'em up, haul 'em in, deport them the hell out of here.



Not just in Collier County, that is nationwide.

ENFORCE AND DEPORT!

ENFORCE AND DEPORT!

ENFORCE AND DEPORT!

Here in central FL, Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco counties are considered sanctuaries, unfortunately. I'm sure Tampa is as well with it's democratic mayor.

Naples has a lot of wealthy retires, with big beautiful homes.

Every community needs to get on board and take advantage of these new policies and Executive Orders issued by our President. This is our chance to fix our communities, starting with removing the people who aren't supposed to be here to begin with.

State and local law enforcement needs to deploy its manpower and resources to helping our nation solve this problem once and for all. They have no qualms with dragging a paid passenger off of a United Flight, so they need to do likewise with foreign trespassers, criminals and those present in our country in violation of US immigration law.

The state and local law enforcement officers need to realize that the raise they need to have comfortable lives for themselves and their families is being squandered with the public expenses associated with supporting and dealing with this illegal population.

Municipal police departments wailing they can't hire enough police officers need to understand that they can't hire them because they aren't paying enough money to draw the people and talent they want to take on the difficulty and risk of the jobs, and the reason you don't have enough money is because you're spending too much public money on illegal aliens.

Illegal immigration is a dive to the bottom for our country. Always has been, always will be. We have US immigration law for a reason and that is to protect the lives, jobs, opportunities and assets of the American People. It's not to be mean, it's not to be unwelcoming, it's not to do anything negative in anyway.

It's just an obvious necessity, the same reason we use bank accounts to protect our money, the same reason we have security alarms to protect our homes, the same reason unions were supposed to protect our workers, the same reason we have a military to protect our nation, the same reason we have a government to begin with to "secure the blessings of liberty for the people of the United States and our posterity."

Yes, that's the purpose of our government as defined by our Founders in the Preamble of the United States Constitution. That is why we have US immigration law and must enforce it to the letter and verse, because if you don't protect it, you will lose it. Simple law of the universe.

First thing - we simply must get the word out and make people understand it is just 11 million.

That is the figure they have been using since Pres. Bush was first elected. It is somewhere between 20 and 30 million.

Why are they getting away with that lie?

Because they are afraid that if people know the real number, they'll all be thrown out of office without a dime.