The human face of immigration raids in Bay Area

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 4/27/7 | Tyche Hendricks

[SmithL]

Arrests of parents can deeply traumatize children caught in the fray, experts argue

-- Immigration agents arrested siblings Victor and Elvira Mendoza, 21 and 17, when it turned out the fugitive they were looking for no longer lived at the Mendozas' home. Officers detained 6-year-old U.S. citizen Kebin Reyes for 12 hours when they arrested his father as an illegal immigrant.

These and many other families across the Bay Area and the nation were turned upside down this year by Operation Return to Sender, a federal immigration crackdown begun last May. The raids focus on illegal immigrants who have ignored deportation orders, but 37 percent of the 18,149 people arrested nationwide through Feb. 23 were not wanted fugitives.

Mental health experts say the raids are traumatizing children. Legal scholars and public officials are raising constitutional questions about the way the raids are carried out and about their impact on communities as a whole. And immigrant advocates say changes in immigration law -- including tougher provisions enacted in 1996 -- leave little room for illegal immigrants to correct their status.

"They (the raids) are putting some teeth back in immigration law," said Tim Aitken, deputy director for detention and removal operations in the San Francisco office of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. "Our focus is, we want to go after the worst of the worst. ... But we can't be blind to someone who doesn't have lawful status in the United States."

The American Civil Liberties Union and the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights sued federal authorities in San Francisco on Thursday on behalf of Kebin Reyes, now 7, saying agents violated the child's civil rights when they took him into custody. Attorneys charge that the federal government violated Kebin's Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights to liberty...

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