Posted on 09/18/2007 9:59:50 AM PDT by AuntB
The recent enforcement action carried out by the Boston office of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), whose agents swooped through several area towns to arrest 36 members of the notoriously violent street gang MS-13, has touched off a storm of protest among local immigrant advocacy groups. These groups have berated local police for cooperating with ICE, and launched "training sessions" across the state to discourage immigrants from cooperating with law enforcement.
"We understand trying to remove violent people, but in doing so you end up terrorizing entire communities," said the director of Centro Presente, a Cambridge non-profit. Yet judging from the criminal histories of the gangbangers arrested by ICE, it is pretty clear just who has been terrorizing whom.
No random street sweep, the latest operation was carefully planned and executed over three days with the assistance of 12 other law enforcement agencies, mostly local police and sheriffs. It is part of a long-term nationwide ICE effort, known as Operation Community Shield, to identify and remove criminal alien gangsters. All those arrested were members of MS-13, and had rap sheets for crimes such as murder, assault and battery, armed robbery, and drug offenses. All but four were illegal aliens and now face removal. The others were permanent residents whose criminal histories are likely serious enough to cost them their green cards.
For a long time, gangs in Massachusetts were strictly a local affair. In recent years, however, national gangs such as Crips and Bloods have entered the scene, as well as the transnational MS-13, which originated among the large illegal alien communities of El Salvadorans in southern California. It began aggressively expanding its franchises in the early 1990s, migrating eastward. Its membership is now believed to number 10,000 in the United States, and possibly 50,000 more in Central America and Mexico.
Illegal alien gangsters typically are employed by day in construction, auto repair, or other blue collar work, but moonlight at night in retail drug trafficking, theft, extortion, or mob-style violence. Some have had paramilitary training in their home countries and are hardened veterans of the chronic civil strife in their homelands. Their victims tend to be fellow immigrants, as the gangsters know that many newcomers bring with them a distrust of police, and hope they will hesitate to seek help.
MS-13 members are responsible for a number of particularly vicious murders and assaults around the country, including the 2002 rape in Somerville, Mass., of two deaf girls, one disabled and in a wheelchair.
Immigration law enforcement is uniquely well suited to address the problem of transnational gangs. Federal agencies estimate that 80-90 percent of MS-13 members are illegal aliens. This lack of status presents a glaring vulnerability that local police must not hesitate to exploit in their efforts to disrupt the gang's criminal activity. We are stuck with native-born criminals, but need not accept the fiscal and social burden of criminals who have no permission to be here in the first place.
In addition to helping get alien gangbangers off the streets, immigration law also offers valuable tools, such as visas, work permits and other benefits, to encourage, protect, and reward witnesses, informants, and victims of gang crimes.
The Boston ICE Office has arrested about 260 gangsters since 2005, ranking in the top 10 offices nationwide for alien gang arrests. According to ICE statistics, roughly 60 percent of those arrested were involved with MS-13. About one-fourth were 18th Street members (one of the oldest Hispanic gangs, known for recruiting in elementary and middle schools), and one from a gang that calls itself Born to Kill. Nearly two-thirds of the gangsters arrested here are from El Salvador; most of the rest are Honduran, Guatemalan, and Mexican.
Their crimes are serious and often brutal: four were murderers, another four were child rapists, more than 100 had been arrested for assault, another six for armed robbery, and eight more on weapons charges.
When ICE launched Operation Community Shield in 2005, local law enforcement agencies around the country, even those whose political leaders had declared them sanctuaries for illegal aliens, jumped at the chance to help, providing intelligence and investigative support, and welcoming ICE agents on to gang task forces.
In some places, though, including Boston, local immigrants' rights groups have objected strenuously, contending that such cooperation will poison the relationship between local police and immigrant communities and cause immigrants to shy away from reporting crimes. These claims are specious and do a huge disservice to immigrants. No empirical, or even anecdotal, evidence exists to support the idea that an association between local police and immigration authorities produces this so-called chilling effect.
Officials in Florida, Alabama, Virginia and other places where cooperation with ICE has been institutionalized will tell you that local-federal cooperation simply does not incite racial profiling nor stifle reporting of crime in immigrant communities. In fact, the most recent major enforcement action in the area prior to this one, on Nantucket, was launched in response to the please for help from the foreign-born residents there who were being victimized.
ICE has only 5,500 special agents to deal with a national illegal alien population of at least 12 million and a criminal alien population of at least 600,000. State and local law-enforcement agencies are encountering a growing number of foreign-born criminals and victims, but lack the expertise to understand the issues involved. Every police force and sheriff's office in Massachusetts owes it to the residents they serve to work cooperatively with ICE and also to acquire a basic understanding of immigration law and how it can help protect their communities.
Jessica Vaughan of Franklin is senior policy analyst at the Center for Immigration Studies, in Washington, D.C., and co-author of a forthcoming study on illegal alien involvement in gangs.
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland.php?id=1344177
What Is 287(g) and Why Should Illegals Be Worried about It?
By Peter Gadiel
Sept. 17, 2007
Many Americans, even those who are immensely concerned about illegal alien crime against U.S. citizens, have no idea what 287(g) is. They do not know how it can greatly benefit our country and law enforcement professionals, nor how it can counter the corrosive and dangerous effects of sanctuary cities. For those of us who care, however, it is a dream come true.
According to James Carafano, Ph.D. and a leading expert in defense affairs, intelligence, military operations/strategy, and homeland security at the Heritage Foundation (emphases mine):
Section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) provides the legal authority for state and local enforcement to investigate, detain, and arrest aliens on civil and criminal grounds. Any comprehensive border and immigration security legislation by Congress should include provisions for strengthening and expanding programs authorized under §287(g).
Dr. Carafano goes on to say:
Any effective solution for reducing illegal border crossings and the unlawful population in the United States must address all three aspects of the problem: internal enforcement of immigration laws, international cooperation, and border security. Internal enforcement and international cooperation are essential to reducing and deterring the flood of illegal entrants into the United States, making the challenge of securing America’s borders affordable and achievable. Nothing less than a comprehensive reform will do. This reform must include restoring the integrity of U.S. immigration laws.
Fortunately, for us, a program that can meet all of these essential requirements already exists. It is known as 287(g).
Section 287(g) of the INA allows the DHS and state and local governments to enter into assistance compacts. Both sides must agree on the scope and intent of the program before it is implemented, which gives states and local communities the flexibility to shape the programs to meet their needs. State and local law officers governed by a §287(g) agreement must receive adequate training and operate under the direction of federal authorities. In return, they receive full federal authority to enforce immigration law, thereby shifting liability to the federal government and providing the officers with additional immunity when enforcing federal laws.
Brewster, New York, is a community at the forefront of protecting its citizens, as it is the first in the State of New York to adapt 2987(g). Mayor John Degnan has announced that his town will become the first jurisdiction in the New York State to apply for federal authority to enforce immigration laws. Brewster’s police will be empowered to question and arrest suspected illegal aliens, and to pass them on to federal authorities for deportation. Makes you want to move to Brewster, doesn’t it?
With him, as he made the announcement, were Ed Kowalski and Bruce DeCell, board members of 9/11 Families for a Secure America. Mayor Degnan gave Mr. Kowalski full credit for educating him on the need for state and local police across the country to become involved fully in enforcing immigration law.
In 2005, Mr. Kowalski’s 17-year-old niece, Elizabeth Butler, was stalked, raped and stabbed to death by Ariel Menendez, an illegal alien from Guatemala, with four prior convictions. After the murder, Menendez, attempted to flee to sanctuary in Guatemala with the help of his father and sister, also illegal aliens. Menendez is now serving life in prison without possibility of parole. His father and sister were never prosecuted for aiding his attempt to escape, and the federal government has taken no action to deport them despite their status as illegal aliens.
In his statement Mr. Kowalski noted that “Rape, violent assault, control of neighborhoods by violent gangs and drug manufacture and distribution are committed by illegal aliens at a far higher rate in the US than by citizens and legal immigrants.” He also cited the 9/11 Commission Report which stated: “There is a growing role for state and local law enforcement agencies [for the enforcement of immigration law]. They need more training and work with federal agencies so that they can cooperate more effectively with those federal authorities in identifying terrorist suspects as well as criminals”
Kowalski added that “Government at all levels must make the prosecution and deportation of law-breaking illegal aliens a top priority…That includes drunk driving as well as theft, rape and murder.” Terrorism and criminal activity are most effectively combated through a multi-agency/multi-authority approach that encompasses federal, state and local resources, skills and expertise. State and local law enforcement play a critical role in protecting our homeland because they are the first responders when there is an incident.”
In July, Morristown, N.J., became the first town in that state to apply for immigration enforcement authority. 9/11 FSA board member Bruce DeCell said that: “The decisions by Morristown and Brewster to become the first in their states to apply for immigration enforcement authority show that Americans will no longer tolerate becoming victims of illegal aliens just so that big corporations can have cheaper labor or any political party callously can hope for new voters.”
He warned Charles Schumer and Hillary Clinton “that New Yorkers now realize that their senators are partly to blame for the flood of illegal aliens in the U.S. They have on their hands the blood of people like Elizabeth Butler who have been the murder victims of illegal aliens.”
So, there is hope for law abiding citizens and legal immigrants to live in peace without the threat of crimes committed against us by people who should not even be here. This abomination, illegal alien crime against Americans, is abetted through the existence of sanctuary cities which, as defined by Amanda Carpenter in Human Events, “protect illegal aliens through local resolutions, executive orders or city ordinances. City police departments may also issue their own special orders, policies and general orders to the similar effect.”
But the very existence of sanctuary cities runs counter to the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission which stated: “There is a growing role for state and local law enforcement agencies [for the enforcement of immigration law]. They need more training and work with federal agencies so that they can cooperate more effectively with those federal authorities in identifying terrorist suspects.” Listen up America: 287(g) is the answer.
Let’s all follow Brewster’s lead and make sure our communities adapt this extremely important provision.
ping
Here’s what the Mexican gangs are up to in my neck of the woods every day. There’s an interesting article yesterday about countries that are not helpful in drug crimes etc. They didn’t mention Mexico. Probably because most of their organized crime is growing the dope here now.
http://voanews.com/english/2007-09-17-voa46.cfm
US Anti-Drug Report Faults Venezuela, Burma
By David Gollust
State Department
“Associated Press - September 18, 2007 8:55 AM ET
GLENDALE, Ore. (AP) - A Douglas Interagency Narcotics Team says an illegal marijuana grow is 1 of the largest cartel grows ever seized in the county.
The first report of the grow came over the weekend and had the take at about 4,000 plants. Today, the Douglas County agency has announced its agents seized over 10,000 marijuana plants weighing over 8,000 pounds. And agents say that’s worth more than $$16 million.
The grow was found on Thursday on a federally funded helicopter recon assignment. Over the course of the next two days, officers discovered ten separate grow sites covering more than a square mile.
Officers also found several booby traps and two firearms, but no arrests have been made.”
http://www.ktvz.com/Global/story.asp?S=7090711
Read this asinine statement again. I had to read it three times to reach the logical conclusion that entire communities of illegal aliens are full of violent people.
So evidently, this "advocate" wants violent people left in place to prey on the very people for whom they claim to be "advocates". Go figure.
This very "logic" was in place in the U.S. Senate during the last shamnesty showdown when a majority (including our pair of goofs from PA) voted down the Coryn amendment which would have excluded these type of people from amnesty.
If we aren't allowed to pick out the rotten apples, then we have to reject the entire load.
YOUR national parks and forests:
http://www.oregonlive.com/newsflash/regional/index.ssf?/base/news-21/1190017790241290.xml&storylist=orlocal&thispage=2
“Usually, Strickland said, the growers are Mexican nationals hired by large drug trafficking organizations, including Mexican cartels.
Officers found a loaded rifle at a main campsite plus punji sticks, sharpened branches stuck into the ground waiting the foot of a hapless passer-by.
Trash and clothes littered the ground, along with bags of fertilizer. Saplings had been hacked down to allow more sunlight to reach the marijuana.
The growers dug their own irrigation pond and black irrigation hoses snaked through the forest.
“In Northern California last year, Strickland said officials cut down between 1.5 million and 2 million plants and may have missed half of what was there.
Douglas County, said Deputy Zack Williamson, an investigative support specialist for DINT, is prime land for growers getting pushed north.
“We’ve got our finger in the dam, he said.”
The House and Senate should totally close down until they fix the problems of our border and gangs in our communities. Last I heard, Los Angeles has 250 officers assigned to gang activity. The city has reported that there are over 70,000 gang members. We need a national policy concerning borders and gangs. At this point in time, Congress has done absolutely nothing in regards to our borders. They know what the people want but refuse to comply with the wishes of the people. Time to replace them.
So the answer is easy. Get rid of the illegals.
There is nothing wrong with any Liberal that being forced to live for a year in a gang neighborhood won’t cure.
It is outrageous have our government allows foreign criminal gangs to remain in the country. We have enough gang problems of our own.
A storm of protest over murdering, raping gangsters? Obviously, they advocate amnesty for all over any sort of law and order. Deport these groups too.
“We understand trying to remove violent people, but in doing so you end up terrorizing entire communities.”
The only folks who’d be TERRORIZED by an ICE raid on MS-13 are ILLEGAL ALIENS!! So be it. Carry on.
B T T T
Furthermore, as extra credit point, it should be sent also to pro-sanctuary type local officials for their comments as well. I think in their cases they will ignore it. But at least we can keep the heat on them.
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