Arrests of illegals up 500 percent in Colo., Utah, Wyo.
By DEBORAH FRAZIER
Scripps-McClatchy Western Service
January 22, 2001
DENVER - Arrests of illegal aliens increased by more than 500 percent last year in a three-state area - Colorado, Utah and Wyoming - after more federal agents were put in the field.
Five Quick Response Teams were added in rural Colorado by the Immigration and Naturalization Service in October 1999. The move swelled the number of alien workers arrested in the INS's Denver district that includes all three states.
In 1999, the INS arrested 920 aliens in the three states. Last year, the number of arrests jumped to 5,276, including 4,167 by the response teams.
"It's impressive, especially when you think about how small the offices are," said Joseph Greene, INS regional director.
There are 50 INS agents on the teams, including detention officers - all part of a $21 million national quick response program.
The bulk of the arrests stemmed from Colorado State Patrol officers making routine stops for bad brake lights, accidents, broken-down vehicles and traffic violations and finding the vehicle full of smugglers and illegal aliens.
In past years, the patrol and citizens complained that the INS had a catch-and-release program because most illegal aliens were released and only the smugglers were arrested.
With the new response teams, patrol officers who find cars, vans and trucks loaded with undocumented workers call the INS, and the nearest office takes over.
"We assume the amount of smuggling has remained constant, but we didn't have the resources out there to catch as many before," said John Torres, assistant district director for the INS in Denver.
Throughout the 1999-2000 fiscal year, law enforcement officers called on the INS teams in 1,376 cases involving 307 loads of aliens smuggled into the U.S., Greene said.
"We're seeing smaller loads, an average of eight people a load," Greene said. "I remember the days of smuggling people in railroad boxcars and 18-wheelers. They may be cutting down because we're out there now, and there's less of a loss when we do catch them."
Many cases resulted from accidents.
"Most of the smugglers' vehicles are unsafe, so we feel we've been more effective in saving lives: those of the undocumented workers and other drivers," Torres said.
Colorado has long been a major conduit for smugglers, Greene said, and became more so as the INS focused on the Mexican border in Texas and California and the routes through Arizona and New Mexico.
The response team agents and Greene emphasize prosecution of the smugglers who have little regard for their human cargo.
"They're callous, cold-hearted, greedy criminals that lock undocumented workers in the back of vans and rental trucks for days without water, food or sanitation," he said.
Greene said that more than 1,000 cases were referred to prosecutors nationwide in 2000 for charges related to alien smuggling, including 22 cases involving federal criminal charges.
Greene said one sign that the INS efforts were denting the lucrative smuggling industry was that the cost of being smuggled is going up.
"It used to be under $1,000. Now
it's creeping up over $1,500," he said. "Maybe it's a sign that the smugglers
have to cover more losses."
(Deborah Frazier writes for the Denver Rocky Mountain
News.)