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Posted on 07/10/2003 3:30:05 AM PDT by kattracks
Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) - The Department of Homeland Security's new Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) delivered a pointed message Wednesday to any foreign national who might come to the U.S. planning to sexually exploit American children for pleasure or for profit.
"For these persons, the welcome mat to our nation has been pulled," said Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge. "Make no mistake, those who enter the country to harm our children commit not only a despicable act, but also a deportable crime."
ICE enforcement teams put action behind their words, even before the words were publicly spoken, as the agency launched "Operation Predator."
"ICE fugitive teams located and apprehended 89 foreign nationals who've been convicted of sex offenses, but had later evaded law enforcement efforts to remove them from the country," Ridge explained. "They are [now] on their way out."
Since March 1, ICE has made 88 additional arrests, garnered 56 indictments, obtained 77 convictions, executed 134 seizures of contraband and launched 192 new investigations into suspected sexual predators of children.
Ridge noted that a new National Child Victim Identification Program has positively identified the children in some 300 pieces of child pornography. As a result, the pornographers will not be able to escape prosecution by claiming that the images were digitally created fakes rather than photos or videos depicting the molestation of real children.
Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), stressed the importance of involving the country's customs and border enforcement agency in the fight against child exploitation.
"Increasingly, organized criminals and terrorist groups are using child pornography as a source of revenue," he said. "Truly national borders are no barrier to these kinds of crimes."
According to the new ICE website Operation Predator's three-pronged strategy of "identification, investigation and removal" includes:
- A single web portal to access all publicly available Megan's Law databases;
- A new toll-free reporting number, 1-866-DHS-2ICE; and
- A new multi-agency unit at its CyberSmuggling Center to oversee and coordinate Operation Predator activities at the national level.
Mike Garcia, assistant secretary of ICE, said the new agency is better able to prioritize its missions than when the duties were spread between the former Immigration and Naturalization Service and the former Customs Service.
"While we have 50,000 criminal alien absconders, we are now prioritizing those with violent crimes, those [who are] sexual predators and particularly those predators who prey on children," Garcia explained. "It's the same with the institutional removal program where we go to prisons ... to make sure that those people do not leave the prison and go back out on the streets."
Asa Hutchinson, undersecretary for border and transportation security, said the ability of ICE to work with other federal, state and law enforcement agencies will result in an expanded ability to catch foreign nationals who prey on America's children, not a duplication of efforts.
"There are unique enforcement capabilities of immigration agents and customs agents that have been combined [in ICE]," he said. "And, so, we have a unique ability that can pursue these types of cases that others do not have."
John Walsh, host of the Fox television show "America's Most Wanted," addressed the question of why the nation's primary anti-terrorism agency should be involved in the prosecution of crimes like child pornography.
"If you are the parent of a murdered child or a missing child, if there's a predator in your area who's lurking and trying to grab kids in the vicinity of your school, that's a terrorist. You would be terrorized," said Walsh whose young son was kidnapped and later killed. "That kind of terrorist is at the top of my list, the terrorist who preys upon children."
Walsh also had his own personal warning for foreign nationals who plan to use and abuse children in the U.S.-based on his experience with America's Most Wanted helping ICE capture nine of their ten most wanted fugitive criminal aliens.
"You cannot stay in the United States," he said. "This group will hunt you down and you will be sent back to your country of origin."
According to statistics from NCMEC, one out of every five girls and one out of every 10 boys will be sexually victimized in some manner before reaching age 18. Only one in three of those who are victimized will typically report the incident to law enforcement authorities.
E-mail a news tip to Jeff Johnson.
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