U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers have arrested more than 2,000 illegal immigrants in a surge of arrests between July and August, around 85 percent of which had criminal convictions and pending criminal charges.
In a Tuesday press release, ICE reported that between July 13 and Aug. 20, ICE officers arrested 1089 illegal immigrants with past criminal convictions and 863 more with pending criminal charges.
Tony H. Pham, the acting director for ICE, said, “The aliens targeted during this operation preyed on men, women and children in our communities, committing serious crimes and, at times, repeatedly hurting their victims.”
“By focusing our efforts on perpetrators of crimes against people, we’re able to remove these threats from our communities and prevent future victimization from occurring,” Pham added. “Through our targeted enforcement efforts, we are eliminating the threat posed by these criminals, many of whom are repeat offenders.”
ICE provided graphs detailing the number of criminal convictions among those arrested.
ICE also provided a graph of the number of pending criminal charges among those arrested.
ICE noted many of those arrested had multiple charges or convictions, and provided a list of the criminal convictions and charges included among those arrested.
Of the convictions and pending charges, ICE recorded:
- 388 convictions and 386 pending charges for assault – including simple assault, battery against family and non-family members and assault against law enforcement;
- 291 convictions and 216 pending charges for domestic violence;
- 83 convictions and 64 pending charges for sexual offenses – including rape, sexual assault, indecent exposure and failure to register as a sex offender;
- 136 convictions and 63 pending charges for family offenses – including neglect and cruelty towards a spouse or child;
- 71 convictions and 40 pending charges for sexual offenses involving a minor;
- 14 convictions and 12 pending charges for homicide – negligent manslaughter and murder;
- 23 convictions and 44 pending charges for harassment – extortion, intimidation and harassing communications;
- 29 convictions and 7 pending charges for hit-and-run;
- 20 convictions and 10 pending charges for robbery;
- 12 convictions and 2 pending charges for contributing to the delinquency of a minor;
- 9 convictions and 15 pending charges for kidnapping;
- 11 convictions and 3 pending charges for identity theft;
- 1 conviction and 1 pending charge for arson; and 1 conviction for rioting.
In the press release, ICE stated it “does not exempt classes or categories of removable aliens from potential enforcement. All those in violation of immigration law may be subject to arrest, detention and, if found removable by final order, removal from the United States.”
In the 2019 fiscal year, ICE arrested individuals with more than 1,900 convictions or charges for homicide, 1,800 for kidnapping, 12,000 sex offenses, 5,000 sexual assaults, 45,000 assaults, 67,000 crimes involving drugs, 10,000 weapons offenses, and 74,000 DUIs.
ICE deported some 267,258 illegal immigrants in 2019 and 256,085 in 2018.
