Thread: 3 Students Deported to Mexico

3 Students Deported to Mexico

By Daniel González
The Arizona Republic

GILBERT, AZ -- Three Valley high school students were deported to Mexico after a Gilbert police officer stopped the car they were in for drag racing and called federal immigration officials.

A federal immigration official called the deportations of the three juveniles "very uncommon." The head of the Gilbert Human Relations Commission questioned whether the students were victims of racial profiling.

The deportations come at a time when several local law enforcement agencies have agreed to partner with federal immigration officials to enforce immigration laws, raising fears in immigrant communities that routine traffic stops could lead to large-scale deportations.

Gilbert is not one of the communities partnering with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Lt. Joe Ruet, a spokesman for the Gilbert Police Department, said the three juveniles were occupants of a 1998 Mitsubishi Eclipse that was stopped for drag racing on North Velero Street near Guadalupe Road at 11:12 p.m. Saturday.

The officer called ICE after the driver, Jaime Cisneros, 16, of Chandler, said he didn't have an Arizona driver's license but did own a Mexican driver's license, although he was not carrying it, Ruet said. Police charged Cisneros with exhibition of speed and criminal speed, both misdemeanors, he said.

Ordinarily, Gilbert police do not ask questions related to immigration status, he said.
However, officers have discretion to contact ICE if they have reason to believe someone is in the country illegally. Cisneros' statement that he had a Mexican driver's license "opened the door," he said.

The officer turned the three juveniles over to ICE officials, who confirmed that the teens were in the country illegally. The students were returned to Mexico after officials from the Mexican Consulate's Office interviewed them, said Lauren Mack, an ICE spokeswoman. In each case, a parent was also contacted, she said.

In September, ICE officials in Arizona instituted a policy to respond to every call from local police departments to pick up undocumented immigrants involved in criminal activity, Mack said. The policy was instituted in response to complaints from local police departments that ICE officials weren't doing their job.
Since then, the agency has responded 441 times to calls from 39 law enforcement agencies and picked up 2,408 "deportable criminals," she said.

Only two or three of those calls, however, have involved unaccompanied juveniles, she said.

"It's very uncommon," she said.

Tami Smull, who chairs the Gilbert Human Relations Commission, said she was not aware of the incident, but she expressed concern.

"It would sadden me if this was a racial-profiling event by a patrolman," she said. "It does demand additional answers."

Smull said she planned to bring the matter up at the commission's next meeting in April.

Jorge Solchaga, head of the protection unit at the Consul General of Mexico in Phoenix, identified the other students as Johany Nafarrate, 17, of Chandler, and Omar Galvez, 16. His residence was not known.

Solchaga said the three said they live in the Valley with their families and attend high school here. He could not recall which school the students said they attend.

Other stories in my home state.


Tucson Region
Mesa's air deportation hub is busiest
Volume reflects state's top status for illegal entries
The Associated Press
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 03.05.2007
'PHOENIX — An airport in Mesa is the busiest air deportation hub in the nation, and has seen its number of deportations skyrocket in the past three years. Deportations at Williams Gateway Airport in Mesa have risen sharply from about 6,150 in fiscal year 2003 to about 15,914 last year. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials say that is because Arizona is the country's main crossing point for illegal immigrants and has two large detention centers, in Florence and Eloy.
The former military base in Mesa and an airport in Alexandria, La., are the only major air transportation hubs in the U.S. for deporting non-Mexicans to their home countries.
1. The taxpayer-funded flights have helped cut deportation times by months, removing about 51,300 non-Mexicans from Oct. 1, 2005, to Sept. 30, 2006, mostly to countries in Central and South America, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials.
The flights have been key to ending the government's long-standing policy of releasing thousands of non-Mexicans into the United States pending immigration hearings and serve as a deterrent to illegal immigration, officials say.
Analysts say the flights also are central to President Bush's political efforts to curry favor with hard-liners in hopes of coaxing a comprehensive immigration bill out of Congress. The flights were expected to increase as the administration pushes for stronger enforcement.
The flights already have increased fivefold since 2001. They carried more than 116,000 passengers last fiscal year, enough to rival some small U.S. airlines. That total consists of the 51,300 non-Mexican deportations and 64,700 illegal immigrants flown from the interior of the United States to centers like the one in Mesa to be deported.
In fiscal year 2006, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials say the agency spent more than $70 million flying illegal immigrants home or to the border. In addition, an October inspector general's report sampling flights from Mesa and other air deportation hubs found planes that frequently flew less than half full.
Bush has vowed to end "catch-and-release," the practice of arresting non-Mexican illegal immigrants, processing them and then releasing them here pending immigration hearings.
More than 85 percent of the illegal immigrants caught by the Border Patrol crossing the southern border are Mexicans. Most are sent back home within 24 hours. But sending illegal immigrants from other countries back home isn't as easy. In the past, the government often lacked enough detention space to hold them while legal paperwork was processed. So non-Mexicans were simply freed and told to return later for court hearings. The problem peaked in 2003 and 2004. Thousands of illegal immigrants from Brazil and Central America started flooding across the Arizona and Texas borders. Most disappeared after being released. Illegal immigrants are less likely to cross if they know they will be quickly sent home rather than set free pending immigration hearings, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said.
Pablo Campos, who oversees the air transportation system for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Washington, D.C., said the agency tries to keep deportation flights full by making stops in several countries when there aren't enough from one country to fill the aircraft.
But immigration officials say that filling every flight isn't always possible. Top priority is given to removing illegal immigrants from the United States quickly to clear space in detention centers. Some countries limit the number of illegal immigrants with criminal records they will receive at one time.
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/metro/171989.php


Suspected smuggler dies in clash with Border Patrol agents
1. 09:32 AM MST on Thursday, March 1, 2007
By ARTHUR H. ROTSTEIN / Associated Press Writer
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) -- At least one U.S. Border Patrol agent shot and killed a man among a group of suspected drug smugglers during a confrontation Tuesday night south of Tucson, authorities said.
Santa Cruz County sheriff's investigators were looking into whether five suspected drug smugglers mistakenly thought they were being robbed at gunpoint when confronted Tuesday night by U.S. Border Patrol agents about 20 miles north of the Mexican border. Sheriff Tony Estrada said Wednesday that his detectives were trying to determine whether any shots were fired at the agents before the suspected smuggler was shot.
At least one of the backpack-toting men threatened the agents and ended up being shot to death, authorities said. The other four dropped their marijuana-filled packs and ran, but were later caught.
"They threatened (the agents) and apparently the agents fired," Estrada said. "And apparently the individual was attempting to shoot at the agents when he was shot. Definitely the agents were threatened by at least one of the individuals."
Earlier, Estrada had said the agents - belonging to a Border Patrol SWAT team - ordered the group to halt and at least one backpacker opened fire, with one or more agents shooting back.
Estrada said investigators haven't determined whether the backpackers thought they were being jumped by rival smugglers, "but that's always a possibility."
In the past two months, six people believed to be smuggling drugs or involved with human smuggling have died in southern Arizona violence. That includes two Mexican men who died and two who were injured when they were assaulted in the same area as Tuesday's shooting by armed men wearing camouflage while transporting marijuana.
In another incident, a van loaded with migrants was shot at near Eloy in January, killing the driver and wounding a passenger. On Feb. 8, three people died and two others were wounded when they were attacked northwest of Tucson. Authorities said both shootings may have involved rival smugglers. Estrada said bandits often shoot first and grab the load.
"If it is a rip-off, these guys are not going to take any chances. It just creates a real dangerous environment for everybody. They'll shoot, and the smugglers will either scramble or leave the drugs behind. They'll shoot to kill."
In Tuesday evening's incident, Border Patrol spokesman Gus Soto said several agents spotted a group of five men and ordered them to halt.
Shots were fired and one man was fatally injured at the site, Soto said. The rest are being held for questioning, Soto said.
Estrada said deputies found five bundles of marijuana and two firearms, one of them with the dead man.
Soto said the sequence of events, including how many shots were fired, by whom and when, will be part of the investigation by sheriff's office and the Border Patrol as well.
"If the person has the means, opportunity and intent to do serious bodily harm against the agent, our agent can take the appropriate action," Soto said.
The incident was the second fatal shooting by a Border Patrol agent in the Tucson sector since the start of this year, and the seventh involving shots fired at or by agents during the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, Soto said.
The area has seen a recent increase in drug thefts, illegal immigrant smuggling and various drug-related problems, Estrada said.

http://www.fox11az.com/news/topstories/ ... 8c8f2.html

Triple homicide exposes violent toll of human trafficking
1. Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 02.09.2007
The detailed picture that emerged Friday about events that led to bandits shooting and killing three Central American illegal entrants in northwest Tucson provides a glimpse into the violent underbelly of human trafficking in Arizona where people are viewed as commodities.
Here's how events unfolded early Thursday morning northwest of Tucson near the Silver Bell Mine Road area that took the lives of two men and one woman.
Authorities have not yet released the nationally, age or names of the victims.
Between 4:30-5 a.m., a Dodge pickup stolen out of Phoenix was driving north across the Tohono O'dham Reservation with a group of 15-20 Central American illegal entrants, said a press release from the Pima County Sheriff's Office.
A group of bandits tried to stop the vehicle and opened fire when the truck refused to stop. Authorities estimated the gunfire came from four bandits shooting high powered rifles. Bullets entered the front and side of the truck, the release states.
The gunfire likely came from assault weapons or AK-47s, judging by the casings found said Lauren Mack, spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is also investigating the shooting.
After the shooting began, the truck continued traveling at high speed along Silver Bell Mine Road before it lost control and ran off the the dirt roadway into the desert. The occupants got out of the vehicle and ran into the desert.
There were at least seven people in the vehicle that the Pima County Sheriff's Office has accounted for but there could have been at least 10 more people involved, based on interviews with the four survivors.
The four people that fled the scene left behind a dead female in the center front seat and a dead man in the bed of the truck, said Pima County Sheriff's Department Bureau Chief Richard Kastigar.
They made it back to the roadway, apparently dragging a man who had been shot in the head. A 21-year-old Mexican man who was shot in the hand and lost some of his fingers left the group and went in another direction.
Authorities learned Friday that that individual, Pedro Luis Beltran-Camargo, 21, of Chapalita, Sonora, Mexico was the guide, or coyote, in the truck and arrested him. The other four were picked up on the Silverbell Mine Road by another truck carrying illegal entrants. The truck drove about eight to 10 miles northwest until the driver realized the seriousness of the injuries his passengers, Kastigar said.
They ordered the three illegal entrants still alive out of the vehicle, dumped the body of the man who had been shot in the head and kept driving, the report says. The man died on the side of the road, the report said.
A local rancher found the three survivors and called 911. He found:
- A Guatemalan woman who had been wounded in the chest and neck, Sevastiana Quextan-Gomez, from Mareos, Guatemala.
- Olinda Arelina Mateo-Gomez, a 15-year-old girl from Mareos, Guatemala, who was not injured.
- Selvin Eristo Boj-Chavajay, an uninjured adult male from Sucahitepeques, Guatemala.
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/hourlyupdate/168462

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