Crime
ICE: 662,000 criminal foreign nationals to be deported are living free nationwide
ICE-ERO Baltimore Fugitive Operations agents arrested and removed 19-year-old Guatemalan national Henry Argueta-Tobar, who was illegally in the country and convicted of raping a Maryland resident.
From The Center Square
By
387,000 criminal noncitizens arrested by ICE between fiscal 2021 and 2023
More than 660,000 criminal foreign nationals identified to be deported by U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement are freely living in communities nationwide.
Among them are those convicted or charged with violent crimes, including homicide, sexual assault and kidnapping, according to information released in response to a congressional request.
ICE was requested to provide information about the number of noncitizens on its docket for removal who are convicted or charged with a crime. As of July 21, 2024, “there were 662,566 noncitizens with criminal histories on ICE’s national docket, which includes those detained by ICE, and on the agency’s non-detained docket. Of those, 435,719 are convicted criminals, and 226,847 have pending criminal charges,” ICE Deputy Director Patrick Lechleitner said.
This includes criminal foreign nationals convicted of, or charged with, homicide (14,914), sexual assault (20,061), assault (105,146), kidnapping (3,372), and commercialized sexual offenses, including sex trafficking (3,971).
An additional 60,268 are on the list for burglary/larceny/robbery; 126,343 for traffic offenses including driving under the influence (DUIs) and 16,820 for weapons offenses.
ICE’s national docket refers to illegal foreign nationals who were apprehended by Border Patrol agents who then turn them over to ICE. Despite having a confirmed documented criminal history, ICE released them into the United States.
Lechleitner notes that some local jurisdictions “have reduced their cooperation with ICE, to include refusal to honor ICE detainer requests, even for noncitizens who have been convicted of serious felonies and pose an ongoing threat to public safety” due to their so-called “sanctuary city” policies. “However, ‘sanctuary’ policies can end up shielding dangerous criminals, who often victimize those same communities,” he said.
Because of local jurisdictions refusing to cooperate with ICE, the agency lifted detainers for 24,796 known criminals and released them into the U.S., he said. The data is from Oct. 1, 2020, through July 22, 2024.
Among them, state and local law enforcement agencies refused to comply with 23,591 detainer requests; 1,205 detainer requests were lifted “due to insufficient notice to ICE.”
Also during this period, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations issued 2,897 detainers that were declined by state or local law enforcement agencies even after the subject of the detainer request had a subsequent apprehension by ICE ERO, according to the report.
Lechleitner also notes that “most noncitizens who are convicted of homicide are typically not eligible for release from ICE custody under §236(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act” but “ICE officers may use their discretion in making custody determinations and release noncitizens with conditions.” He says these determinations are made on a “case-by-case basis.”
In response, U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Mark Green, R-TN, said, “It may be shocking to hear that the Biden-Harris administration is actively releasing tens of thousands of criminal illegal aliens into our communities, but their own numbers conclusively prove this to be the case.
“This defies all common sense. Under President Biden and his ‘border czar,’ Vice President Harris, DHS law enforcement has been directed to mass-release illegal aliens whom they know have criminal convictions or are facing charges for serious crimes – and these dangerous, destructive individuals are making their way into every city and state in this country. How many more Americans need to die or be victimized before this administration is forced to abide by the laws they swore to uphold?
“This is madness. It is something no civilized, well-functioning society should tolerate.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said the number was “shocking.”
“If accurate, it means that almost 10%” of the criminal illegal foreign nationals released into the country by the Biden-Harris administration “are criminals. It also debunks the narrative that illegal immigrants are less likely to commit crime. We can’t survive four more years of this.”
More than 387,000 criminal noncitizens were arrested by ICE ERO agents in fiscal years 2021 through 2023, The Center Square first reported.
The majority arrested were citizens of Mexico, Nicaragua, Columbia and Venezuela.
The majority of arrests occurred in Dallas and Houston, Texas, according to an ICE online statistical dashboard. The most common arrests are of those convicted of DUIs, drug possession, and assault and criminal (non-civil) traffic offenses like hit-and-run or leaving the scene of an accident, ICE says.
Additionally, a separate data point shows that U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Border Patrol apprehensions of criminal noncitizens totaled nearly 54,000 since fiscal 2021, according to CBP data as of Sept. 16. The majority were for illegal entry and reentry and DUIs.
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
Leaders in Aurora, Colorado, are looking to boost funding of its police force by roughly $10 million as reports of local Tren de Aragua activity continue to make national headlines.
The City of Aurora’s proposed 2025 budget includes a $125 million increase in funding, with an emphasis on law enforcement as international gang activity and retail crime has increasingly become an issue for the local community. The proposed plan would boost the police budget from $155.7 million in 2024 to nearly $165 million in 2025.
“Right now, we are not at our full complement of officers,” Aurora Police Department Chief Todd Chamberlain said to CBS News Colorado. “Our patrol is impacted by understaffing issues, and so that’s what I’m looking at right now.”
“I want to be able to have our officers have a clear understanding of what they are responding to before they even get there,” Chamberlain continued. “I want to see where our crimes are occurring, when they’re occurring and who they are occurring to.”
Aurora has been subject to massive media attention after footage of armed men inside an apartment complex went viral in August. Federal immigration authorities later confirmed the men in the video footage are members of Tren de Aragua and Aurora city officials have since sought a court order to clear the apartment building, according to Fox 31.
Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis initially pushed back on allegations that gang members had taken over apartment buildings in Aurora, with a spokesperson for his office telling the New York Post last month that “this purported invasion is largely a feature of [Aurora City Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky’s] imagination.” Jurinsky has consistently spoken out about Tren de Aragua’s presence in Aurora.
Jurinsky was not entirely optimistic when asked how the extra funding could help Aurora combat crime.
“We have increased funding multiple times,” the council member told the Daily Caller News Foundation on Thursday. “One of the biggest problems in this state, and other like minded states like Colorado is that people just don’t want to be police officers here like they used to.”
“We’ve thrown a lot of money at the problem, and I’m not sure it’s being solved,” Jurinsky continued.
The Aurora Police Department earlier this month confirmed that two brothers arrested for a July shooting that left others hospitalized are members of Tren de Aragua. Both men were taken into custody after the shooting, and police say another two men involved in the incident are also suspected of having ties to the international gang.
Tren de Aragua, an international criminal organization that originated in Venezuela, has increasingly gained a foothold in the United States. Immigration experts who spoke to the DCNF said identifying members of the gang can be incredibly difficult, given poor diplomatic cooperation with the Venezuelan government.
“We have next to no vetting for the Venezuelans who are entering the country, because we have no relationship with the government of Venezuela and that’s true of other migrant nationalities,” Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, told the DCNF. “We have no way of knowing whether they were in prison in Venezuela.”
“We have no idea if they’ve been living in a third-world country for years before they tried to come to the United States,” Vaughan continued. “We’re essentially letting them in on their word.”
Crime
In Just 48 Hours ICE Nabbed Four Illegal Migrants For Alleged Sex Crimes Hiding Out At Elite Vacation Hotspot
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
In a span of just two days, federal immigration authorities nabbed four different illegal migrants charged with various sex crimes on a ritzy Massachusetts island beloved by the liberal elite.
Deportation officers arrested Felix Alberto Perez-Gomez, Elmer Sola, Gean Do Amaral Belafronte and Bryan Daniel Aldana-Arevalo on Nantucket, Massachusetts, between Sept. 10 and Sept. 11, according to several press releases by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). All illegal migrants targeted were previously accused of sex crimes against children or other residents in the community.
The latest ICE announcement pertained to the apprehension of Perez-Gomez, a previously deported Guatemalan national who unlawfully returned to the United States before being charged with indecent assault and battery on a person 14 years or older, according to the agency. Deportation officers arrested the Guatemalan man on Sept. 11 on the island, and he remains in the agency’s custody.
Elmer Sola and Bryan Daniel Aldana-Arevalo — both Salvadoran nationals charged locally for sex crimes against children — were arrested on Sept. 10, according to ICE. Sola was arraigned on three counts of aggravated rape of a child and eight counts of indecent assault and battery on a child, and Aldana was arraigned on one count of a rape of a child with a 10-year age difference and two counts of indecent assault and battery on a child
“Elmer Sola unlawfully entered the United States, then made his way into our Nantucket community before allegedly committing some horrific and despicable crimes against a child,” Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Boston Field Office Director Todd Lyons said in a press statement.
“The officers of ERO Boston will not tolerate such a threat to the children of our New England neighborhoods,” Lyons continued.
Deportation officers also nabbed Gean Do Amaral Belafronte on Sept. 11, according to the agency. Belafronte, a Brazilian national living in the U.S. illegally, was arrested by Nantucket police in June 2021 for indecent assault and battery on a person 14 years or older before he was detained by federal immigration authorities.
Nantucket has long been an island inhabited by high-income earners who favor the Democratic Party.
The island’s population in 2022 had a median household income of more than $131,000, according to Data USA, far surpassing the median household income of the entire U.S. that same year, which was slightly under than $75,000. Housing has become so expensive on Nantucket that some homes costing as much as $1 million have been offered through a lottery system as a part of a subsidized housing initiative, according to The New York Post.
President Joe Biden earned more than 70% of the vote in Nantucket County in the 2020 presidential election, according to county election results compiled by CNN.
Nantucket is also a top destination for vacationers from around the country. The busiest summer day on the island now hosts more than 60,000 visitors, according to local reporting.
The Obama family enjoys vacationing in the nearby island of Martha’s Vineyard, and purchased a home in 2019 there worth roughly $15 million. Martha’s Vineyard was subject to national media attention in 2022 when Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis flew a number of illegal migrants from his state and dropped them off onto the wealthy island.
The entire state of Massachusetts is identified as a “sanctuary” jurisdiction by the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that tracks such laws across the country. The group cites a 2017 court decision that limits local authorities’ ability to detain migrants wanted by ICE agents.
The ICE arrests were not initially well received by all residents of the Nantucket community.
“It’s frightening for so many,” Esmeralda Martinez, a member of the Nantucket School Committee, said to the Nantucket Current when word of the ICE raid was first circulated earlier this month. “People are hiding in fear that they might be here for them even though most don’t have a criminal record, but for the mere fact that they are not legally here.”
The Daily Caller News Foundation reached out to Martinez and asked if she still felt this negatively about the ICE raid, given that those arrested have been accused of child sex abuse or other sexual crimes, but did not immediately receive a response from the school committee member.
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