Could this be Called Persecution?

Immigration Raids Single Out Hispanics, Lawsuit Says
By NINA BERNSTEIN
New York Times
Published: September 21, 2007

A federal lawsuit filed yesterday charges that agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement unlawfully force their way into the homes of Hispanic families in the New York area without court warrants or other legal justification, sometimes pushing down doors in the middle of the night, in search of people who do not live there.

The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court in Manhattan as a class action, accuses the immigration agency of conducting the raids in violation of the Fourth Amendment’s protection from unreasonable searches, harming citizens and legal residents of the United States as well as foreigners here illegally...

According to the complaint, the raids are part of a program called Operation Return to Sender that was started in 2006 to arrest and deport “fugitive aliens” or immigrants previously ordered to leave the country. But, the lawsuit contends, “the agents regularly raid homes where the fugitive is not present and could not reasonably have been believed to be present.”

The complaint contends that “the unstated goal of these raids is to gain access to constitutionally protected areas in hope of seizing as many undocumented persons as possible” to meet annual arrest quotas recently increased by the agents’ superiors to 1,000 per fugitive team, up from 125 arrests in 2003. Mark Thorn, a spokesman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the New York region, said that he was not familiar with the lawsuit, and that the agency does not comment on litigation...

In the case of ..[the Aguilar] family, immigration agents burst into their home in East Hampton to hunt for an illegal immigrant without a criminal record — Ms. Aguilar’s ex-husband, who had not lived in the house since 2003, when they divorced and he was ordered deported.

After detaining and questioning the frightened family members, including Ms. Aguilar’s 12-year-old daughter and 4-year-old son, the complaint said, the agents threatened to return.

In an account disputed by agents at the time, the complaint contends that another plaintiff, Nelly Amayo, was arrested in her East Hampton home when she demanded to see a search warrant. It says agents twisted her arm and eventually left her in her nightclothes in Manhattan.

Another raid was in a rooming house in Mount Kisco, N.Y., where David Lazaro Perez and other residents were awakened about 4 a.m. March 18 by agents who did not show a search warrant. The complaint said agents took his wallet containing $700 and that it was returned without the money.





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