berto64
03-30-2007, 05:34 AM
Jail to start checking immigration records
Lindsey Collom
The Arizona Republic
Mar. 29, 2007 04:07 PM
Deputies and detention officers will soon be checking the immigration status of every person booked into a Maricopa County jail and place holds on undocumented persons for possible deportation.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio made the announcement Thursday, several days after 37 deputies and detention officers completed a five-week training class of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency that gives them the power to enforce federal immigration laws.
Arpaio said ICE will train a total of 160 sheriff's employees that are slated for the department's Illegal Immigration Interdiction strike force, or Triple I. The strike force includes three components: a community action team, human smuggling unit and jail operation.
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As of Thursday morning, the sheriff's deputies had arrested 20 people on suspicion of being in the country illegally; 13 were arrested after someone reported suspicious vehicles in the desert near Carefree Highway and Interstate 17. The other group was arrested in a bank parking lot near 51st Avenue and Broadway Road. Arpaio called it "good police work" on the part of deputies that contacted the occupants of two vehicles that were parked outside the bank before operating hours.
The arrests were a first for the department that, until recently, had arrested people on suspicion of conspiring to smuggle themselves if found in the company of a human trafficker. The Sheriff's Office has made nearly 500 of those arrests since August.
Lindsey Collom
The Arizona Republic
Mar. 29, 2007 04:07 PM
Deputies and detention officers will soon be checking the immigration status of every person booked into a Maricopa County jail and place holds on undocumented persons for possible deportation.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio made the announcement Thursday, several days after 37 deputies and detention officers completed a five-week training class of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency that gives them the power to enforce federal immigration laws.
Arpaio said ICE will train a total of 160 sheriff's employees that are slated for the department's Illegal Immigration Interdiction strike force, or Triple I. The strike force includes three components: a community action team, human smuggling unit and jail operation.
advertisement
As of Thursday morning, the sheriff's deputies had arrested 20 people on suspicion of being in the country illegally; 13 were arrested after someone reported suspicious vehicles in the desert near Carefree Highway and Interstate 17. The other group was arrested in a bank parking lot near 51st Avenue and Broadway Road. Arpaio called it "good police work" on the part of deputies that contacted the occupants of two vehicles that were parked outside the bank before operating hours.
The arrests were a first for the department that, until recently, had arrested people on suspicion of conspiring to smuggle themselves if found in the company of a human trafficker. The Sheriff's Office has made nearly 500 of those arrests since August.