ICE Issues List of ‘Fugitive’ Illegal Immigrants Freed by New York City’s Sanctuary City Policies

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on Friday increased the pressure on New York City’s sanctuary policies — putting out a list of illegal immigrant fugitives who have been released into the city despite requests from ICE to hand them over for deportation.

Acting ICE Director Matthew Albence presented the list to reporters at a press conference in New York where he spoke of the dangers of sanctuary cities — in which jurisdictions ignore detainers issued by ICE for arrested illegal immigrants.

{snip} While the Trump administration has been warning of the dangers of such policies for months, it’s a fight that has been brought into the spotlight by the murder of a 92-year-old woman, allegedly by an illegal immigrant sprung from custody in November after New York ignored an ICE detainer.

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The list of fugitives put out by ICE includes suspected illegal immigrants from Nigeria, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Guinea, Spain, and El Salvador. Those released have arrests for assault in the first, second and third degrees, attempted robbery, criminal possession of a weapon, gang assaults and other violent offenses.

ICE also issued a list of illegal immigrants currently in custody, who it says “may be released into New York communities” after they have served their sentences. Among the crimes for which those in custody have been charged include rape, murder and sexual assault against a child.

Mayor Bill de Blasio has defended the city’s sanctuary city policies, saying that it makes the city safer and noting that there are some crimes for which the city will cooperate with federal immigration enforcement.

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But Albence cited statistics saying that last year ICE lodged 7,526 detainers via its New York field office. Those individuals accounted for 17,873 criminal convictions and 6,500 criminal charges. He went on to say that those charges and convictions include over 200 homicides, over 500 robberies, over 1,000 sexual offenses, over 1,000 weapons offenses, and over 3,500 assaults.

However, only about 10 detainers were honored by the city, officials said.

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