ICE official lavishes Collier Sheriff’s Office with praise (Marco Eagle)

ICE official lavishes Collier Sheriff’s Office with praise
By RYAN MILLS
Posted February 22, 2010 at 7:41 p.m.

A high-ranking official with a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Miami was in Collier County on Monday, and praised the Collier County Sheriff’s Office’s 2-year partnership with ICE as not only a model for Florida, but for the country.

Sheriff Kevin Rambosk has previously called his agency’s version of the controversial 287(g) program — named for the section of the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act which permits it — a model for other communities, linking it to a decreased jail population and crime rate. Since the program’s October 2007 inception in Collier, the Sheriff’s Office has placed more than 2,300 detainers for removal on suspected criminal aliens.

On Monday, David Bradley, the acting deputy field office director for ICE’s detention and removal office in Miami, echoed Rambosk’s claims.

“They have been named as a model 287(g) site here,” Bradley said. “Our partnership with them is as strong as it was a couple of years ago when we first started the program.”

On any given day, Bradley said he deals with about a dozen similar programs in Florida, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The problems that some of the programs experience on an almost daily basis are rare in Collier, he said.

That success is due to strong internal communication, shared responsibility and Collier taking “ownership” of its program, he said.

“They’re one of the first 287(g) programs set up in the country, so the longer you’re on board, the better and better it’s going to be,” Bradley said.

Commander Mike Williams, who heads up Collier’s program, said he has been surprised how well his agency has worked with ICE, considering they have different computer systems and different cultures.

“We’ve had a great relationship with them from start to finish,” Williams said.

Bradley also addressed concerns raised by the Daily News about ICE not providing a list of names of suspected illegal immigrants who have been detained in Collier County since the program’s inception. The Sheriff’s Office provided such a list last summer, but denied a request in December saying ICE does not allow them to provide it.

Bradley said ICE is not allowed to release names due to Congressional mandate and the Department of Homeland Security’s privacy policy. That information is only provided to family members and attorneys.

“Nobody disappears when they come into ICE custody,” Bradley said. “We have so many different ways that family members and documented attorneys can find out the status, where they are, visitation times. We have a 24-hour command center in this field office alone.”

The Sheriff’s Office’s partnership with ICE permits trained deputies to act as immigration and deportation agents. Last year, the Sheriff’s Office also signed onto ICE’s new Secure Communities initiative, which screens fingerprints of people being booked into jail and attempts to match them to FBI and Homeland Security databases.

“It’s a smarter way of doing business,” Bradley said. “No profiling involved, like what was alleged with some 287(g) sites, because everybody’s prints get transmitted to the FBI’s ... system.”

Critics of the Sheriff’s Office’s partnership with ICE say the program has alienated a section of the community that is already afraid of law enforcement, and leads to racial profiling.

“I don’t believe that’s true,” Bradley said. “I think that ICE does a really good job nationally on focused enforcement, focusing on first those who pose the greatest threat to the community.”