Up until today Albuquerque, the big city across the Rio Grande, has been a sanctuary city. The police were not to ask about immigration status unless 'it is pertinent to the investigation'. Trouble was nobody knew what that was meant and the ex-mayor was happy with that. >:( A New Year and a new administration headed by a new mayor, RJ Berry.
From the Sierra Vista Herald (AZ) today. Announced in mid to late afternoon here in NM.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.(AP) — A new prisoner-processing facility will check the immigration status of every person arrested in New Mexico's largest city, but Albuquerque's mayor on Thursday denied any effort to shadow Arizona's tough crackdown on illegal immigrants.
"This has nothing to do with immigration law. This has to do with keeping the streets of Albuquerque safe," Mayor Richard Berry said after the facility was unveiled.
The biggest difference between the current booking facility and the new 5,000-square-foot site is that U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents have a station inside, where they can check any prisoner's immigration status.
ICE agents work at jails elsewhere, but Police Chief Ray Schultz said the Albuquerque facility is believed to be the first to have a station inside the booking area where those agents can check fingerprints or photos to examine a prisoner's immigration status.
Bill Jepsen, assistant director of ICE's office for New Mexico and West Texas, said the facility will make work easier for agents because they'll maintain a 24-hour presence.
He said currently, up to 40 illegal immigrants are detained each week at the Bernalillo County jail, but others are sometimes released before their immigration status can be checked.
Critics of the Arizona law, set to take effect July 29, have complained that it encourages racial profiling and is unconstitutional.
It requires police enforcing other laws to question a person about his or her immigration status if there is "reasonable suspicion" that the person is in the United States illegally and makes it a state crime to be in the country illegally.
Berry said complaints about racial profiling would be off the mark because every prisoner at the Albuquerque facility will stop at the ICE station. He said the immigration status of anyone booked for a crime "is always pertinent."
While campaigning for mayor last year, Berry criticized a city policy that characterized Albuquerque as a "sanctuary city" for illegal immigrants.
"There was an ambiguity in the policy," Berry said. "They knew that they may or may not be checked when they were arrested. That was the concern I had. This is a well balanced way to address it."
Berry also insisted he won't tolerate racial profiling.
He noted the agreement with federal officials to work at the new facility was reached months ago, long before Arizona's law made headlines, and said Albuquerque's approach protects crime victims and witnesses, who won't be questioned about immigration status.
"Immigrants from any nation are welcome in Albuquerque," Berry said. "Criminals are not."
Schultz said representatives from other cities, including Seattle, Pittsburgh and Oakland, Calif., have visited to learn more about Albuquerque's model.
The new facility isn't a jail — merely the first stop for anyone arrested by Albuquerque police, county sheriff's deputies or University of New Mexico police. After processing, prisoners are loaded into vans for transport to the jail.
A lot of changes in there and the way I see it, every one good!
Nothing racial there; if one is arrested you get processed through ICE just to be sure. Illegal Canadians and Brits can be caught too, if they commit an arrestable crime.
That's one way to disprove racial profiling. Test every detainee.
Good idea. Good for them.
Good post Don - I wonder if Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, or any other of the race baiters will travel to Albuquerque to protest if a Canadian or Brit is improperly detained ???
Last night the ABQ city council voted on a bill introduced by 2 Councillors to kill the bill. They claimed it going to be used discriminatory. About a hundred people showed up to speak, most were for the ABQ law. Some, against the law, siad the issue was not about immigration rights it was about human rights. That's nuts, where is it written that anyone has the right to go/move to any country they want? Anyhow in the end the ABQ law was left standing, by one vote. Interestingly the D voted against the new law and the R voted for it.
That was a nail biter. Also still standing is the Mayor's new ICE policy at the jail..
Announced today: 31 illegal immigrant criminals arrested since the city started their program. 31 Criminals who are also illegally in the USA. 31 in one week. DWI's, a rapist, an attempted murder, drig sales and assorted burglaries and robberies.