A 12-day Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operation targeting criminal aliens ended last Friday and resulted in 153 arrests in South Texas.
According to ICE, Federal officers from Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) made 24 arrests in Austin and Waco, 62 arrests in San Antonio, 29 arrests in Laredo and 38 arrests in Harlingen. Of those arrested, 138 were men and 15 were women.
“ICE’s primary immigration enforcement efforts target convicted criminal aliens,” said Daniel Bible, field office director for ERO in San Antonio. “Consequently, our operations improve overall public safety by removing these criminals from our streets, and ultimately from our country.”
ICE says that all foreign nationals targeted by their officers during the enforcement action had prior criminal convictions.
One 46-year-old Mexico national was arrested in San Antonio on March 31. The man was convicted of aggravated sexual assault of a child, a first-degree felony, 2 DUIs and assault. He is currently in ICE custody pending removal proceedings.
A 20-year-old man from Guatemala was arrested by law enforcement in San Antonio on March 23 and later convicted of injury to a child with intent to cause bodily injury. He is presently in ICE custody awaiting a hearing before an immigration judge.
“The vast majority of those arrested (137 of the 153) had criminal histories that included convictions for the following crimes: aggravated assault with a weapon, aggravate sexual assault of a child, driving under the influence (DUI), sexual assault, burglary, robbery, resisting officer, vehicular manslaughter, alien smuggling, domestic violence, cocaine possession, prostitution, fraud, simple assault, cocaine possession, dangerous drugs and controlled substance distribution.”
The arrested illegal aliens in the South Texas operation included those from five countries. ICE took in 140 Mexicans, 7 Hondurans, 3 Guatemalans, 2 Canadians and 1 El Salvadoran.
The arrests come on the heels of the Trump administration Departments of Justice and Homeland Security saying that agents will continue to make arrests of illegal aliens at courthouses and called for cities to withdraw their sanctuary policies.