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Minneapolis police tangled in immigration enforcement action
Minneapolis Police officers run to the back of the Guayaquil restaurant.
Photo courtesy of Minnesota Immigrant Freedom Network.
U.S. Immigration, Customs and Enforcement (ICE) agents struck at the heart of Minneapolis’s Latino community Saturday, with a high-profile presence and apparent collaboration by the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and the Minneapolis Police Department. Though law enforcement officials claimed the operation targeted identified suspects involved in human trafficking, activists say they also stopped Latino pedestrians, demanding identification and verification of immigration status. The high-profile operation sent people running in panic, emptying some stores in the middle of the week’s busiest shopping day.
Recent raids in Worthington and Willmar have created a climate of fear in immigrant communities in Minnesota. The Willmar raid is the subject of a federal lawsuit, based on alleged violations of constitutional rights by ICE agents who allegedly forced their way into homes without warrants. Racial profiling was an issue in Worthington and Willmar, with ICE agents targeting for investigation those people on the street or in the workplace who “look Latino.”
A community report from the scene comes from Alondra Espejel—Minneapolis Police Department creates chaos with ICE: community responds, demands immigration reform now. To view photos of the operation, visit: MN Immigrant Freedom Network’s Flickr site . To view videos from the scene, visit: Youtube
Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak expressed concern about the impact of Saturday’s events on police-community relations. My understanding is that the police were contacted in the morning by the BCA (Bureau of Criminal Apprehension), that they wanted to execute a warrant involving human trafficking. Our officers were notified, which I understand is fairly standard procedure. My understanding was that ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) would be there. That’s another thing that we are looking at right now. The ICE people had jackets that said police on them, which I am strongly opposed to, and a year ago I formally requested that they stop doing so. They are not police. They work for immigration and those different functions have to be separate to protect all of our citizens. I feel very strongly about that. We have resisted numerous efforts to change that, and I will continue to be rock solid on that. I take this separation ordinance very seriously. I am rock solid – the police should be here first and foremost to protect and serve the people of Minneapolis. Because of what happened in Willmar and what has happened elsewhere around the country, we have to watch this very carefully, and ask people to bring information forward. If police were involved, that violates our policy. ... The role of the police officer is to protect and to serve every person who is in Minneapolis. We know that if there is a fear that reporting something to the police could jeopardize someone’s immigration status, including those that have legal status, then people will not come forward with the information that we need to know. We need people to report domestic abuse, we need them to report gang activity. We have seen many cases where people are afraid to come forward for fear that it will jeopardize their immigration status, even if they are legal immigrants. |
Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak acknowledged Sunday that city officials “are a bit in the dark at this point,” but reiterated that the city of Minneapolis is “absolutely committed to our policy of separating our police from immigration.”
Minneapolis has enacted an immigration separation ordinance, which says in essence that city police should not ask about immigration status except when directly relevant to a criminal investigation. Similar ordinances have been enacted in St. Paul and in cities across the country. Police departments are among the strongest advocates for immigration separation ordinances, which help to establish trust and increase reporting of crimes by immigrant communities.
While Mayor Rybak insists that his commitment is “rock solid – the police should be here first and foremost to protect and serve the people of Minneapolis,” community members are skeptical. Alondra Espejel of the Immigrant Freedom Network, said: “Once you have ICE agents discussing plans with MPD in public, that is collaboration. ... What kind of message does this send to the community? Actions speak louder than words. It is too late now, over 200 community members saw the MPD park next to ICE vehicles, I saw a high up ICE official talking with BCA and an MPD officer. If that is not collaboration, then what is? Let’s stop passing the buck. The MPD metio la pata [put their foot in it], ... Unfortunately, all the evidence we have shows that the MPD, whether they planned to or not, did cooperate with the ICE operation that day.”
Peter Brown of the National Lawyers’ Guild said he would be sending a request for review of Minneapolis police participation in Saturday’s operation to the Minneapolis City Council Public Services committee.
“We are very interested in getting any information and seeing any videotapes that anyone has,” Rybak said. “We are very interested in seeing any tapes and reviewing those and seeing if our officers followed our policy. ... Anyone can reach me at my e-mail at
rt@minneapolis.org.
Minneapolis Police Deputy Chief Sharon Lubinski said, “There are rumors, but we were not there for immigration enforcement.” She said that Minneapolis police were called in on Saturday by the BCA, which was serving “serious warrants that were not immigration violations.” As of Sunday night, no official information was available on how many arrests were made, by what agencies or on what charges.
On Sunday, activists gathered again at Lake and Bloomington to protest the previous day’s operation and, in particular, the apparent participation of Minneapolis police in an immigration enforcement operation. Individuals who had been present on Saturday described Minneapolis police and ICE agents conferring on plans, chasing people and apparently working closely together.
The recently-organized Community Raid Response Committee, summoning its members by text messaging, arrived Saturday shortly after ICE vehicles and Minneapolis police assembled in the parking lot of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church at 28th Street and 15th Avenue. Perry Bellow-Handelman reported that Minneapolis police officers and ICE agents appeared to be conferring on plans, and then proceeded to Lake and Bloomington. Committee members followed ICE agents and police throughout the next four hours, as they moved through the neighborhood. A crowd of activists and community members, which grew to about 200 over the course of the day, observed, protested, distributed literature advising people of their rights, videotaped and photographed the ICE and police operations.
At Lake and Bloomington, the co-owner of Guayaquil restaurant discovered the building’s back door was open and went into the alley to find out who had opened it. Police patted her down for weapons, and told her they had a warrant but refused to show it to her. (Later in the day, officers showed a warrant to the second co-owner of the restaurant.) The owner reported that officers arrested two customers and four people from the apartments above the restaurant. As seemed to be the case throughout the day, it was unclear whether the arrests were made by ICE or BCA agents. Maria Belen Power, another witness, reported that Minneapolis police joined in chasing someone in the alley. The owner of the grocery next to Guayaquil said Minneapolis police also chased someone across his rooftop.
Other witnesses reported arrests at buildings at 30th and Grand, 31st and Pleasant, and 25th and Pleasant, and a search of an apartment at 32nd and Cedar, where agents found no one at home but carried away boxes of material. Law enforcement officers from the Minneapolis Police Department, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and ICE all participated in some way in the operation, and it often was unclear which officers were making arrests.
Patrick Leet, an immigration activist, who was arrested Saturday by Minneapolis police, characterized the operation as “terrorizing the community” and as “a full, frontal attack – to come to Lake and Bloomington on a Saturday afternoon, taking people out of their homes.”
Immigration-related raids have increased across the country during the past five months, with accompanying increases in arrests and deportations. According to a local immigration attorney, “ICE has many more agents and dollars to carry out these actions than they used to and they will spend those dollars and employ their agents to do what Congress and this Administration have charged them with doing. The cold reality is that ICE now has those agents hired, trained, detailed to Bloomington, MN, and they are not leaving.”
Comments
If you're here legally and
If you’re here legally and have done nothing illegal, you have nothing to worry about. If otherwise, well, either turn yourself in or get your a$$ back across the border. You’re breaking the law, plain and simple. No amount of psychosociologicalbabble erases that fact.
Ever seen Mexico’s SOUTHERN border? Looks like the Berlin Wall, but with a lot more guns, tanks, and watchtowers. Huh. Now why would that be?
they may be illegal...
they may be illegal…but you’re an effing idiot. The latino community has done more to boost our community than any other group of people. The very area that was attacked by the police last week used to be the worst part of town. Now they’re selling million dollar condos in that area. Stay in Anoka and do all of us a favor, Nate.
immigration
immigration raids
They upset me. They should do them more often and target them on cinco de mayo or the month of september( independence month) They should really pack up the buses and put our tax dollars to work.
If you're here legally and
If you’re here legally and have done nothing illegal, you have nothing to worry about.
Actually, as the actions of the police and ICE last Saturday seem to show, that’s very inaccurate. The whole problem with racial profiling is that is creates discriminatory, negative treatment along lines of race, particularly towards groups that have been socially and historically mistreated, and are for those and other reasons being targeted by government today. It basically ensures that no matter how ‘assimilated’ you become, no matter your citizenship or financial status, you will still always be subject to inhumane treatment because of your race.
The comment about Mexico’s Southern border is trying to infer a position in the above article that isn’t there. There are many facets to immigration, one of which is Mexico’s relative compliance with US policy. You cannot equate the attitudes, policies, and positions of the Mexican government and state with the people within its borders, any more than you can do that for the US.
Excuse me, but I am here as
Excuse me, but I am here as a citizen of this country and yet because of my ethnicity the police are able to racially profile me on the street, detain me, verify my identity and if unable to do so continue to detain me without probable cause or a warrant. How is being here “legally” thus mean I have nothing to worry about?
As a US-born, law-abiding
As a US-born, law-abiding Latina woman, I see that the focus on “illegal” immigration is only a scapegoat, to keep the fastest growing, civically active, enterprising, pioneering and philanthropic communities depressed. This administration is creating hysteria about the Latino community, focusing on an administrative designation as the end all be all. It’s time to realize that we are all human beings. Latinos have not only revitalized Lake Street, but we’ve fueled to the engine to Minnesota’s sagging economy. Latinos provide positive contributions in Minnesota. It’s time to look at both sides of the ledger.
This is the article I posted
This is the article I posted last night on the blog www.mnblue.com that I write for.
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The ICE man cometh
Submitted by Charley Underwood on May 20, 2007 – 11:48pm.
Two weeks ago, Powderhorn hosted its yearly Mayday parade. Giant puppets and earth-themed floats lumbered down Bloomington Avenue to the park. Lovers kissed in the street. Tall bikes wove back and forth. Total strangers seemed like friends. The theme was “Somos Agua/We Are Water.”
Saturday afternoon, the same neighborhood had a raid. Immigration SUVs occupied the Lutheran church parking lot and the pastor couldn’t get them to leave. Latin-looking people on the sidewalk were asked for their IDs. Restaurant patrons left their meals half-eaten, running from ICE, the immigration branch of Homeland Security. Angry activists surrounded the official cars, and several people were arrested.
On the face of it, several laws were broken by those conducting the raid. Apparently at least one house was entered without a warrant. Racial profiling was evident as only non-whites were asked for documents. And most seriously, it appears as if the Minneapolis police broke the “separation ordinance” passed by the city council three years ago, which specifically prohibits use of city police resources to assist immigration raids.
These raids carry a high human cost. For weeks after the Willmar raids, the Star Tribune and other papers carried stories of children involuntarily abandoned by their detained parents, of day care centers and churches scrambling to find care for the children, of school bus drivers driving around trying to figure out where to leave the children.
The case in New Bedford, Massachusetts, was even worse. Well over three hundred factory workers were arrested (at a factory for body armor destined for Iraq) and most were flown to a special detention facility in Texas. Again the children’s parents were gone, including the nursing mother of a newborn, who eventually was hospitalized for dehydration and malnutrition after refusing the bottle.
Special United Nations Human Rights Council investigator Jorge Bustamante has tried to visit the detention facility in Texas, as well as a similar facility in New Jersey. He has been barred from both facilities and prohibited from speaking with any of those detained. The raids are becoming an international problem.
Those who enforce the laws may have broken laws themselves. Houses have apparently been entered with no warrants. Agents may have broken trespass laws by refusing to leave the church property when asked to do so. But most importantly, the last shreds of trust may have been broken between this growing community and the Minneapolis police.
If Saturday’s raid was an immigration raid, then Minneapolis police should never have participated. If arrests were being made in the serious criminal case of prostitution and human trafficking, as is alleged, then immigration should never have been involved. But if the Minneapolis Police Department seriously expects community cooperation in solving crimes of prostitution or any other crimes, then they certainly should know better than to go running around the Mercado Central with ICE agents in black SUVs and body armor.
Who do the police now expect will call 911 when a crime occurs? And what sort of police protection can crime victims expect if they are more afraid of the police than the criminal?
This situation is going to require more than some big puppets.
Photos of the raid are available at http://www.flickr.com/photos/mnimmigrantfreedom/sets/72157600233342311/
Brief videos of the raid are at http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=ImmigrantRightsNow
I am really upset about this
I am really upset about this whole immigration issue. Our government creates trade packages (NAFTA) which end up hurting people in Mexico. Then they end up having to come here to make a living. Why can’t we in the U.S. address the SOURCE of the problem and then try to solve it in a just & fair way for all?
Mayor R.T. Rybak
Mayor R.T. Rybak
News Release
Mayor Rybak, Chief Dolan Support Crack Down on Prostitution
Renew Call for Immigration Agents to Identify, Distinguish from Local Police
May 21, 2007 – Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak and Police Chief Tim Dolan said today they supported the recent multi-jurisdictional crack-down on an international prostitution ring in Minneapolis over the weekend. The crack-down involved local, state and federal agencies targeting foreign nationals believed to be illegally prostituting undocumented immigrants.
On the morning of May 19, the MN Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) requested the Minneapolis Police Department’s (MPD) assistance to secure the scene where federal law enforcement officials were pursuing a case involving international prostitution.
“These are serious crimes committed against members of the Minneapolis community including those within the immigrant community,” Chief Dolan said. “Human trafficking violates the fundamental human rights and dignity of those victimized. The repugnant nature of the crimes alleged in this case should draw together every member of the community, from every political and ideological point, to speak out against this treatment of women and girls procured like property and held in sexual servitude in our community.”
“Prostitution is not welcome in our community,” Mayor Rybak said. “We need everyone – residents and police – to work together to rid this problem from our community. This is a perfect example of the need for residents to trust local police, but to also understand the separation of local and federal law enforcement.”
Call for Clearer Federal Identification Renewed:
While Rybak and Dolan heralded MPD’s involvement in cracking down on prostitution, they also renewed their call for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to end their current practice of wearing vests that say “police” on them. In a letter sent to ICE officials a year ago, Rybak and Dolan strongly urged ICE agents to comprehensively wear visible identification that clearly distinguishes them from Minneapolis Police Officers.
Some ICE agents currently wear vests with “police” printed on them with no other designation distinguishing them from Minneapolis police officers while conducting raids and other immigration customs enforcement activities in Minneapolis. Rybak and Dolan said that this designation is confusing to residents and disruptive to local law enforcement.
“The role of local law enforcement is first and foremost to protect public safety, and public safety is best served when people with the greatest need trust and work with their police,” Rybak said. “Without trust in local law enforcement, people are needlessly trapped in dangerous situations.”
“By not clearly identifying, ICE agents unnecessarily damage our ability to protect and serve our citizens,” Dolan said. “In Minneapolis, we strive to encourage all our communities to report crime. We will do our part to identify ourselves as “Minneapolis Police” on our outer garments and we believe that ICE can safely and clearly identify themselves on their raid vests as ICE.”
“The City of Minneapolis’ policy remains unchanged: our police officers have no authority in federal immigration matters and will not enforce immigration policy,” Dolan said. “MPD officers will not independently investigate, question, detain or arrest a person when potential immigration violations are the principal issue.”
Are you people serious? ICE
Are you people serious? ICE has a job to do and shouldn’t apologize for doing it. Since when does immigration reform automatically include blanket legalization? Truth be known, the police would love to have ICE resources available to them. The “we are the world” PC atmosphere that permeates your communities is a joke. If you really care for your illegals then pay them the prevailing union wage and invite them to live next door. Tell me what other crime besides illegal entry into the U.S. is arbitrarily ignored by by law enforcement agencies? You people are a joke.
Next ya'll will be saying
Next ya’ll will be saying that ICE and the police should have just left them alone. Where is all the “they are hard working people just coming here to make a better life for themselves?”
They (illegals) are … guess what? Not law abiding citizens. This isn’t rocket science. Let me try to say this one more time, illegals are not law abiding citizens.
In this instance, with human traffiking, human sex slavery, the police and ICE not knowing the ages of the women at the time, bondage and slavery of human beings…..
I think they should have put tape up around a four block area and checked everyone. Even if they were not directly involved, you can’t tell me the neighbors didn’t have some idea what was going on.
I do not want things like this happening in MY country. It is pretty common place in South American countries. We do not need to import this for our girls and women.
The INS/City Separation
The INS/City Separation Ordinance is a complete joke. You may as well just tell illegals that they can break all the laws they want, because no one will come after them for fear of all of this political backlash and the rediculous ordinance.
You are degrading the citizenship of every single person – like my grandmother – who came here LEGALLY and went through the necessary steps to become legal. How fair is this to people like her, who didn’t break the law?
Whine all you want and post all of the emotional babble you can, logic says that if the first thing you do when you get to this country is break the law, you shouldn’t be here.
If I rob a grocery store because I’m hungry and my family is starving, I still go to jail. How do illegal aliens get a free pass?
Are you people serious??? I feel like I’m reading ‘The Onion’ or watching ‘Southpark’. This is the most crazy thing I’ve ever seen.
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