Agents step up immigrant searches

Many who weren't sought also arrested
By Onell R. Soto
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
April 4, 2007

Immigration agents have stepped up efforts in past weeks to arrest people who have remained in the country despite deportation orders or who have returned illegally.

Those efforts have led to detentions and deportation of hundreds of illegal immigrants whom the agents weren't looking for. The work has also stirred fear of arrests in neighborhoods with large immigrant populations.

Agents in San Diego and Imperial counties set out two weeks ago to arrest about 300 people whom they suspected were in the country illegally despite being ordered to leave by immigration judges, said Rob Baker, who oversaw the operation for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

“All these individuals had their day in court,” he said. “They had a final order of removal and they chose to ignore the judge's order.”