Los Angeles Times

New deportatio­n push underway

11 immigrant families already denied refuge are reportedly taken into custody.

- By Nigel Duara nigel. duara@ latimes. com Twitter: @ nigelduara

The detentions of at least 11 families across the country marked the first day of an effort by the government to f ind and deport Central American migrants who sought refuge in the U. S. and stayed illegally, immigrant advocates said Saturday.

Unlike a string of immigratio­n raids in the mid- 2000s, agents do not plan to conduct workplace raids or other mass enforcemen­t actions, but will instead target addresses for families with deportatio­n orders.

In Norcross, Ga., on Saturday, Joanna Gutierrez said her niece and niece’s 9year- old son were taken by Immigratio­n and Customs Enforcemen­t agents, who arrived in an unmarked car and presented Gutierrez with a warrant for a man she didn’t know.

Gutierrez says she told the agents they needed a warrant to enter her home. They told her they didn’t, she says, and walked inside, checking every room in the house and waking her children. “They were shaking from fear,” Gutierrez said of the children in a phone interview Saturday night.

After searching the house, the agents showed Gutierrez a photo of her niece, 30- year- old Ana Lizet Mejia. Mejia f led Honduras when her brother was killed by gangs. She entered the U. S. illegally with her son as part of a wave of Central American migrants seeking refuge from violence in the summer of 2014.

Mejia had never missed a court date, Gutierrez said, and wore an ankle monitor provided by the court.

“Why abuse a person who is already in the control of the court?” Gutierrez said.

According to an online inmate locater, Mejia and her son are now in custody, though ICE officials would not confirm the raids and did not give any details on the fates of the families detained or confirm whether they were being held.

Obama administra­tion officials said in late December that they would step up deportatio­ns of those who had already been told to leave the country.

“Attempting to unlawfully enter the United States as a family unit does not protect individual­s from being subject to the immigratio­n laws of this country,” said an official with the Department of Homeland Security who was not permitted to speak on the record. “ICE will continue to pursue the removal of persons who fall within DHS immigratio­n enforcemen­t priorities, including families who are recent unlawful border crossers and who are subject to f inal orders of removal.”

The official says that ICE is working to secure the U. S.Mexico border, and that the deportatio­ns are part of a plan to convince migrants that entering the country illegally is “fruitless.”

Previous enforcemen­t policy, officials have said, has done little to deter Central American migrants, and judicial orders releasing many migrant families from detention have fed a perception in Central America that anyone who reaches the U. S. can stay.

Immigrant advocates questioned prioritizi­ng non- violent migrants for deportatio­n and whether the facilities that hold them are suitable for minors.

“We think they are gathering people at the Atlanta f ield office,” said Adelina Nicholls of the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights. “We have no idea what’s going on there. That’s not a location to accommodat­e children.”

In Texas, six Central American families detained in the raids are expected to be brought by Monday to the South Texas Family Residentia­l Center about 70 miles south of San Antonio, according to Mohammad Abdollahi, a spokesman for RAICES, a San Antoniobas­ed legal advocacy group for immigrants.

In Georgia, Gutierrez was still trying to f ind Mejia and Mejia’s son late Saturday.

 ?? Saul Loeb AFP/ Getty I mages ?? I MMIGRANT ADVOCATES protest near the White House last week against planned raids to catch people living in the U. S. despite off icial deportatio­n orders.
Saul Loeb AFP/ Getty I mages I MMIGRANT ADVOCATES protest near the White House last week against planned raids to catch people living in the U. S. despite off icial deportatio­n orders.

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