[News] Fwd: GPS tracking of immigrants in ICE raids troubles advocates

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/gps-tracking-immigrants-ice-raids-troubles-advocates-n1042846
GPS
tracking of immigrants in ICE raids troubles advocates
Daniella Silva - August 15, 2019
------------------------------

Federal immigration authorities were able to track an undocumented
Guatemalan woman from the time she left her home in the morning and headed
to work at a food processing plant in Mississippi, to the time she left
work roughly 10 hours later.

They were able to do so because the woman had received an ankle monitor
upon being released from ICE detention, and Immigration and Customs
Enforcement officials used data gleaned from her monitor to target raids
this month on her plant and six others that led to the arrests of nearly
700 people.
<https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/families-anguished-after-massive-ice-raids-mississippi-sweep-nearly-700-n1040546>

Unsealed search warrants from the raid reveal that immigration authorities
have tracked such GPS data from dozens of undocumented immigrants with
ankle monitors.

Lawyers and immigration advocates told NBC News they had not previously
heard of ICE employing this tactic, which they called “troubling” and said
raised concerns about immigrants’ rights.

“It’s troubling to us that people who are released are being tracked for
reasons that have nothing to do with whether they’re likely to appear for
their court cases or abscond,” said Judy Rabinovitz, deputy director of the
American Civil Liberties Union’s Immigrants' Rights Project.

The search warrants for the food processing plants in Mississippi said
undocumented immigrants previously released from ICE detention facilities
on electronic monitoring were found at plants operated by all five of the
companies targeted in the operation. ICE targeted seven facilities operated
by A&B, Koch Foods, Peco Foods, PH Food and Pearl River Foods.

<https://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/video/acting-ice-chief-defends-raids-in-nbc-news-exclusive-interview-66026565673>

“I think it raises questions about whether this is a proper use of the
ankle monitors because taken to its extreme it means they can be monitoring
every place this person goes, every person they meet with, and that raises
various privacy concerns,” Rabinovitz said.

Michelle Lapointe, senior supervising attorney with the Southern Poverty
Law Center, said she questioned whether undocumented immigrants were being
told "about the uses to which monitors can be put toward before someone
agrees to that as a condition to their release."

"I would want to know if all of this is disclosed to people, particularly
if it's going to be used as evidence against those people in a criminal
proceeding down the road," she said.

ICE Spokesman Bryan Cox said in an email to NBC News that “no one is
required to wear an ankle monitor; however, when a custody determination is
made based on the totality of the circumstances in any specific case, GPS
monitoring may be required as a condition of release from custody.”

“Persons released from ICE custody subject to electronic monitoring are, in
fact, subject to electronic monitoring,” he said.

ICE Acting Director Matthew Albence said in a statement this week that
worksite enforcement operations involve “complex criminal investigations of
both employers and employees.”

He said those who “oppose” such investigations were “siding with
unscrupulous businesses.”

“Our investigation in Mississippi continues, and all parties found in
violation of law will be held accountable,” he added. “This includes
employers who profit off their crimes.”

As of Saturday, there were more 99,349 people in ICE’s Alternatives to
Detention program, which allows some immigrants to be released from
detention facilities during their deportation cases, according to ICE data.
Of those, 43,233 were subject to GPS tracking devices, according to the
data. For the New Orleans field office, which includes Mississippi, that
number was 3,588 in total, with 2,770 subject to GPS tracking, according to
the data.

<https://www.today.com/video/300-families-separated-during-ice-raids-in-mississippi-65826885847>

Randy Capps, director of research for U.S. programs at the Migration Policy
Institute, said that only in the last five years has the U.S. had such a
large number of monitored, nondetained immigrants.

“The fact they have such a large monitored population now is something
relatively new, as well as the phenomenon of ICE being able to track a
substantial population of border crossers and figure out what they’re
doing,’ she said.

In the search warrant for Peco Foods, ICE said that queries of immigrants
enrolled in an alternatives to detention program showed 21 undocumented
immigrants worked at its processing plants in Mississippi, 14 of which were
at a plant in Canton.

The warrant goes on to list specific undocumented immigrants that it said
were in the ankle monitor program whose movements were tracked to the
raided site.

In one example, ICE listed the Guatemalan woman, who was first encountered
by immigration authorities at the border in 2016 and was later released
from custody with an electronic ankle monitor and went to live in
Mississippi.
Handcuffed female workers are escorted into a bus for transportation to a
processing center following a raid by U.S. immigration officials at a Koch
Foods Inc., plant in Morton, Mississippi on Aug. 7.Rogelio V. Solis / AP

“Queries of historical GPS coordinates associated with” her ankle monitor
“revealed numerous daily captured coordinates located” within the PECO
Foods Canton processing plant. ICE added the GPS coordinate showed the
woman went to the processing plant “multiple times a week” and remained on
that property for about 10 hours on those days. The woman did not have
employment authorization in the U.S., according to ICE.

In a search warrant for Koch Foods, ICE said queries of immigrants in an
alternatives to detection program showed 16 undocumented immigrants who in
2018 were working at the company’s processing plants in Mississippi and
that as of late July, 21 immigrants have or were working at the plant in
Morton.

In one example, the warrant lists a Guatemalan woman who was encountered by
immigration authorities in June 2018 and was eventually released from ICE
custody with an ankle monitor. GPS coordinates of the woman’s ankle monitor
“revealed numerous daily captured coordinates” with the Morton Koch Foods
plant, according to ICE.

The warrant also said the woman traveled from her house to the plant
“multiple times a week” and stayed at the plant for about eight to 10
hours. ICE said that the woman also did not have employment authorization.

In the warrants, ICE also listed some undocumented immigrants with ankle
monitors who had previously told the agency they had worked at those
companies.

Other tactics ICE used in the operations were confidential informants,
workers who had told them they worked at the plants and evidence of false
documentation.

Oscar Chacón, co-founder and executive director of the Alianza Americas, a
Latino immigrant advocacy group, said such a surveillance tactic “further
stigmatizes” immigrants who wear ankle monitors.

Chacón said he believed the use of the worksite raids and of tracking ankle
monitor data as a tactic was “part of a larger effort to use fear as a way
of promoting the idea that people may feel so trapped” they abandon their
immigration cases or leave the U.S.

Marshall Goff, an immigration attorney in Mississippi representing some of
the families affected by the raids, said people in their communities were
still frightened.

“It’s been scary,” he said. “A lot of people are still frightened right
now, and they’re afraid to ever leave their homes, really to do anything.”
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