Posted on 03/03/2006 11:12:40 AM PST by TheDon
LOS ANGELES - More than 70 undocumented immigrants were found in the home at 2204 117th St. Friday morning, including at least four suspected smugglers, according to Virginia Kice, an ICE spokeswoman.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, backed up by a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department SWAT team, set off diversionary grenades and stormed a so-called drop house at 6 a.m.
Women and children were among the group, which included citizens from Nicaragua, El Salvador and Ecuador.
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(Excerpt) Read more at cbs2.com ...
No problem. After they drop them accross the border, they'll all be back in a month.
Raid turns up 70 illegal immigrants in South LA house
JACOB ADELMAN
Associated Press
LOS ANGELES - Federal officials on Friday raided a squalid house and found 70 illegal immigrants and four suspected smugglers, authorities said.
Federal agents and a sheriff's SWAT team entered the house about 6 a.m., setting off flash-bang grenades as a diversion because there was concern that some of the immigrants were being held hostage, said Frank Johnston, an assistant special agent in charge with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Nobody was hurt in the raid in the unincorporated Willowbrook area of Los Angeles County
Johnston said 70 people from El Salvador, Nicaragua, Ecuador and Mexico, including 15 to 20 women and children, were packed into the grimy one-story bungalow. Some slept 20 to a room, he said.
"It was squalor, absolute squalor," he said. "Bug infestations, trash on the floor."
A .357-caliber Magnum handgun also was found in the house.
The house had bars on the windows and a surveillance camera to monitor the outside, Johnston said.
Authorities were not immediately able to confirm whether any of the people were being held against their will.
However, Johnston said the immigrants likely were being held there until a family member could pay the smugglers' fee - typically $3,000 to $4,000 per person.
Agents have already found a few such smuggling operations in the region this year, said Darren Dowell, an ICE supervisor.
"It's rampant," he said. "It's a problem all through the Los Angeles basin."
Authorities were tipped two days ago when a woman called from Albuquerque, N.M., to say she had been held at the house and believed a relative was being held hostage there, Johnston said.
Authorities wouldn't say how long the woman was held or if she had escaped.
She was flown in Thursday and identified the house so immigration agents could obtain a search warrant, Johnston said.
After the raid, a line of downcast-looking men were herded into a Department of Homeland Security bus for transportation to a downtown processing facility. Some indicated they had been at the house for several months and others had arrived only a day earlier, authorities said.
Inside the residence, graffiti marred the walls and dirty clothes were thrown on the floors. There were two bathrooms but their bathtubs were filled with cardboard boxes.
Eight rooms, each about 6-by-9 feet, were where the immigrants slept.
The house may have been in operation for several months, Johnston said.
Neighbor Eddie Brim, 47, said he saw nothing out of the ordinary that would lead him to believe the house was being used to keep illegal immigrants.
"They were everyday people," Brim said. "We're all neighbors."
A very observant fellow that Eddie. I don't think he would be much use on the Neighborhood Watch. On the other hand, he wouldn't be a nosey neighbor.
70 undocumented immigrants illegal aliens
70 illegal immigrants illegal aliens
four suspected smugglers travel agents/tour guides
Catch and release?
70 Immigrants, Suspected Smugglers Found In Home (Los Angeles) YOU KIDDING!
YOU FIND THEM ON THE STREETS IN THE MILLIONS!
Took this last week on an on/offramp east of Tucson (Marsh Station Road)....not such a great shot, but all those jars are labeled in Spanish.
We were in the area to take pictures of some trains, and upon getting a permit with the Pima County Parks Dept, they advised us about three different times that the area was "dangerous" etc. I guess that is why we needed a permit...that LE views any vehicles in the area as smuggler traffic? When we arrived there were two USBP agents on ATVs looking for fresh footprints in the dry creek. Guess Cienega Creek is one way that illegals come up from Mexico....and wait for the smugglers in the US to pick them up off I-10.
Probably. They'll most likely testify against the smugglers and then be on their merry way.
Meals on Wheels was immediately dispatched to the house and DMV made a rare "house call" to issue drivers licenses and voter registration cards to all.
[/scarasm...I hope]
BTTT
Thanks for the ping.
That's a great photo, Karl. It must have been
startling to see that whole area.
*sigh*
Thanks for the ping, Karl...
Was Ken Mehlman there soliciting donations for the RNC and Presidente Bush?
I just can't believe the inhumanity of this! We need to provide housing, medical care, child care and food stamps for these people. If the were resourceful enough to get to LA then they're the kind of citizens we want. Family values don't stop at the Rio Grande you know.
I kinda doubt it....L.A. politics is dominated by the Democrats and the leftist "California belongs to Mexico" crowd.
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