Immigrants nabbed in feds’ valley sweep

Timothy Pratt

Thursday, May 25, 2006 | 7:14 a.m.

In the largest sweep of its kind in the area, federal agents from several states have captured immigrants across the Las Vegas Valley who had ignored deportation orders, an official said.

Local observers of the immigrant community questioned the timing of the operation, occurring amid congressional debate on the future of immigration laws in the U.S. They also questioned the procedure used in several cases, allegedly involving unwarranted entries into private homes.

The operation targeted dozens of immigrants who had not shown up as ordered for deportation. Of the estimated 12 million people in the country illegally, about 590,000 have outstanding deportation orders, said Virginia Kice, spokeswoman for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Department.

The operation involved more than 10 immigration officers from several states, Kice said. More details are expected today.

Jeremiah Wolf Stuchiner, chairman of the Las Vegas chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, questioned the timing of the raids .

He said the operation might have been timed to create fear within the Hispanic community and discourage it from participating in more immigration demonstrations, as it has in recent months. Additionally, he said the agency could be trying to send the message to "middle America" that it "can deport as many people as it wants."

Kice said that Congress has wanted the immigration agency to "reduce the backlog" of what the agency calls "immigration absconders" or "fugitive aliens" since 2002, and that the recent operation reflected increased funding for "fugitive operations teams" across the nation.

Juan Carlos Aviles, news director for Univision, the largest local Spanish-language television station, said he has observed "a sense of fear" in the Hispanic community as the raids have unfolded - "not only among people who don't have papers, but their children, many of whom were born in the United States and are now afraid their parents are going to be deported."

Stuchiner said he had been contacted by six people whose family members had been detained by federal agents. Other local immigration attorneys had spoken to at least 20 more.

Stuchiner said families told him agents appeared at their homes at 4 a.m. with civil, administrative warrants, which don't allow entry. He said he was told the agents entered anyway, found the people they were seeking and detained them. Kice would not comment on the allegations.

Gary Peck, executive director of Nevada's Amercian Civil Liberties Union, said he would be concerned if the operation was carried out as alleged.

"It's certainly important the federal government and its agents obey the law," Peck said.

Kice said the operation was scheduled to end Wednesday, and that immigrants captured and scheduled for deportation could be detained in California and elsewhere if the North Las Vegas jail could not hold them. Some of the immigrants were deported immediately - as in the case of Mexicans; others, including other Latin Americans and an Iraqi, would be detained while arrangements were made for their deportation, she said.

According to local attorney Robert West, at least one man was caught up in the dragnet by mistake. A man from India who had arrived in the U.S. in the late 1980s and become a legal resident in the 1990s was detained for about seven hours in a case of mistaken identity, West said. The man, a local business owner, was released by midmorning Wednesday.

Kice also would not comment on that case but said the agency "does extensive record checks before we even go out. If there's a question, we're going to do our due diligence."

In any case, she said, allegations of irregularities in the raids "are the kinds of things higher-ups need to hear."