U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recently announced the results of enforcement actions, which resulted in the targeted apprehension of more than 300 individuals within the local area of responsibility (AOR).
ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Los Angeles identified, targeted, and arrested removable aliens who have been previously arrested, or have pending charges or convictions, for crimes against people – including, but not limited to, assault/battery, burglary, child cruelty, domestic violence, kidnapping, and sexual offenses.
“Our officers have continued targeted enforcement operations throughout the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, while incorporating appropriate procedures to safely and effectively perform missions that ensure public safety,” said ICE’s ERO Los Angeles Field Office Director Dave Marin. “These arrests have a significant impact on victims, or potential victims, of these crimes – by focusing our efforts on perpetrators of crimes against others, we were able to remove immediate threats from our communities, and in many cases, prevent future victimization.”
“It is worth pointing out that nearly 30 percent of the arrests made within our AOR were of criminal aliens with previously non-honored detainers – we identified that the highest numbers of declined detainers, in relation to data captured between July 13 and Aug. 20, were from the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department and Los Angeles Police Department,” Marin said. “This highlights the dangers associated with noncooperation among law enforcement driven by misguided policies that often place politics ahead of public safety.”
The current fiscal year (FY 2020) figure for ICE’s ERO detainers lodged within the Los Angeles AOR is more than 25,000. The AOR comprises seven counties – Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, and Ventura.
In FY 2019, ICE arrested individuals with more than 1,900 convictions and charges for homicide, 1,800 for kidnapping, 12,000 sex offenses, 5,000 sexual assaults, 45,000 assaults, 67,000 crimes involving drugs, 10,000 weapons offenses, and 74,000 DUIs. Similar data for FY 2020 will be available when ICE publishes it year-end statistics.
