In a two-week sweep that ended Oct. 2, ICE officers arrested 1,327 immigrants in five southern California counties: Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura. A total of 530 people were arrested in their communities on immigration violations; ICE said 258 of them—less than half of the total--were "fugitives" who had failed to comply with deportation orders or who had reentered the US after being deported. ICE claimed that half of the 530 people arrested in the communities had criminal histories.

At the same five counties' jails ICE took custody of another 797 people it described as "previously unidentified deportable foreign nationals" who had been scheduled for release. Some of those arrested in the sweep were lawful permanent residents who were said to be deportable because of crimes they committed. Of the total 1,327 people arrested, about 1,100 were from Mexico, 170 were from Central America and others came from more than 25 countries including Armenia, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Jordan, Peru and Vietnam. Nearly 600 of them had already been deported by Oct. 3. The US attorney's office plans to prosecute more than 45 of those arrested on felony charges of reentry after deportation. (Los Angeles Times, Oct. 3; ICE news release, Oct. 3)

From Immigration News Briefs, Oct. 28

See our last posts on the immigration crackdown and the struggle in California.