By Jim Nolan
The Richmond Times-Dispatch, Va.
VIRGINIA — On paper, it sounds like a good opportunity — the federal government, through U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, will train and authorize state and local officers to enforce immigration laws.
The program, enacted under Section 287 (g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, has been around for more than 10 years.
But in practice, the initiative — one of many attempts by the government to address the hotly debated issue of illegal immigration — has not been well-received.
Fewer than two dozen law-enforcement agencies across the country have opted to partner with ICE to train officers to enforce immigration laws.
Four of the 23 agencies participating in the program are in Virginia: The Prince William-Manassas Detention Center, the Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office, the Shenandoah County Sheriff’s Office and the Herndon Police Department.
No law-enforcement agencies in the 20-locality greater metro Richmond region, including the Virginia State Police, participate. When contacted, some were unaware that the program existed, but most officials said they have chosen not to sign up.
The reasons range from a determination that illegal immigration was not a large enough problem in their community, to the logistical and manpower burdens that the officials say working with the federal government would place on their agencies. The business of immigration enforcement, they say, should belong to the feds.
In Richmond, police said they were concerned with the impact that enforcing the laws would have on gaining the trust and cooperation of resident immigrant populations needed to help solve crimes in their neighborhoods.
“We want people in the community to trust the police to come forward with information to report crimes, whether they witness them or are victims of them,” said Richmond Police Chief Rodney Monroe.
“We all have our individual roles and continue to help and support each other,” Monroe added. “But if we were to engage in a large-scale immigration-status check, we would lose our ability to have people come forward.”
Goochland County Sheriff James Agnew said illegal immigrants are not a large problem for the county yet. He said his office had received limited cooperation in the past when they have called customs-enforcement officials.
Agnew also questioned whether initiatives such as the training program were an attempt to shift the immigration-enforcement responsibility to local jurisdictions.
“They’re passing the buck for something they’ve ignored for decades,” Agnew said. “We look at it as a federal issue — we have our hands full with other things. Years of neglect have led to this, and I don’t see the need for us to [participate] at this time.”
ICE spokesman Richard Rocha said the agency and its local partners have made more than 20,000 arrests on violations of federal immigration law over the past two years.
But he acknowledged that participation in the voluntary program is not necessarily the right fit for every local jurisdiction. He said ICE works with agencies to determine whether a different approach or ICE program can better address local illegal-immigration challenges. He said different agencies also participate with ICE on multiagency teams like joint terrorism task forces.
Just because ICE does not have a partnership with a state or local law-enforcement agency doesn’t mean that jurisdictions won’t contact the agency when they encounter an illegal immigration component to a crime, Rocha said.
Officials in Hanover and Henrico and Dinwiddie counties are among the law-enforcement agencies that have cooperated with ICE.
Under the law, any illegal immigrant arrested for another crime in the U.S. must first go through the criminal-justice system, including serving any time mandated by the courts, before the question of their legal status in the country can be addressed. Local agencies are allowed by law to ask about immigration status after an arrest is made.
“Normally what an agency will do is give ICE a call ... alert us to somebody in the country illegally,” Rocha said. “We have strong relationships and hope they would contact us.”
But past experiences have left at least some of those relationships strained.
Local officials interviewed said ICE does not always respond in a timely fashion when jurisdictions report contact with illegal immigrants.
“We’ve picked up people and called ICE and told them that they were illegal, and they told us to turn them loose,” said Capt. Scott Moser of the Caroline County Sheriff’s Office.
Others have termed it “catch and release.”
In a recent presentation to Culpeper Town Council, Police Chief Scott Barlow said the federal resources are so limited that ICE typically responds only to illegal-immigration cases involving violent felons, what was described as the “worst of the worst.”
It was among the reasons the chief recommended that the town not partner with ICE to receive training, according to the Culpeper Star-Exponent.
Officials said attempting to enforce immigration laws under the current system also places heavy burdens on local agencies, given the legal options open to those arrested under such laws.
“You can’t just grab someone; they can put up a hell of a fight,” said one top Richmond-area police official.
“If the truth was that the federal partner would come to us [when we have an illegal immigrant] and say we will get him out or pay for him while he’s there, then it would start tomorrow,” the official said. “But now all you’re really doing is creating a problem for yourself.”
Copyright The Richmond Times-Dispatch