3
Street roots
May 23, 2014
I
U
Î i T
K
F O R W A R D T H IN K IN G
BY NATHAN GILLES
S T A F F W R IT E R
ast month, a ILS. District court ruling
in Portland started a chain reaction
that’s slowly stripping U.S. |
Immigration and Custorfts Enforcement
(ICE) of a controversial policing tool.
However, from a data-sharing program to a
new mobile fingerprinting initiativeymany
immigrant rights’ advocates suspect ICE
has a few technological tricks up its sleeve
— tricks, they say, that violate individual
i rights.
yy
The ruling that so shook up ICE involves
the case of Maria Miranda-Olivares v . ,
Clackamas County. The enforcement tool .
the Miranda-Olivares ruling is robbing ICE
of is called an 1-247 Detainer, commonly
called an ICE hold.
_ .
ICE holds work, like this: if you’re g
arrested and you’re an immigrant, ICE can
request your local jail hold you for 48 hours,
or long enough for ICE to come pick you
up, send you to an ICE detention center,
and possibly deport you. This, in effect, is
what happened to Portland-are resident
B
fingerprints, faces and eyeballs. These
devices, they say, collect data on individuals
before they’re arrested and officially
charged with crimes and therefore
represent — among others — a clear
violation of the
right to privacy.
Biometric cataloging of immigrants also
happens at U.S, borders and airports
through a Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) program called US-VISIT.
The program collects fingerprint data on all
international
travelers to the
U n ite d S ta te s .
arrestees, ICE officers used racial profiling
when first identifying individuals to stop,
handcuff, fingerprint and arrest.
“How th at worked in New Orleans,” says
Gonzalez, “is ICE agents would literally be
roaming th e streets and would stop people
[who looked Latino] in parking lots, in
grocery stores, at Bible study groups and
laundromats, and would stop and finger
Equally troubling,
A s c o n n ty - f a ils a lt e r t h e i r
history in the
print them .”-■
say im m ig r a n t rig h ts
ICE officers referred to this as “going
United States of
p o lic ie s , a c tiv is t s n e r v o u s ly
advocates, is a new
hunting,” according to Gomez’s NOWCRJ
testing out new J
ICE effort that
aw ait ICErs next wave, one
report. Gonzalez saysthe scans qualify as
technologies on
employs mobile
that m any suspect w ill
warrantless searches conducted without
communities that
fingerprint readers to
Include the Increased use ©I
can’t push back...
probable cause and represent a clear
verify immigrants’
that’s why we see I devices th a t can read
violation of the arrestees’ rights.
status before they’re
“This is a problem. ICE is conducting
the use of these
arrested. The
lin g e rp rin ts, laces, and
these
arrests based on racial profiling and
technologies in
program is called the
lack of warrants, and they’re still pursuing
immigrant and | .... eyeballs» These, devices,, they
Criminal Alien
deportations against the victims of these
impoverished
say, collect data on
Removal Initiative
violations,” says Gonzalez.
communities,” says
in d ivid u a ls heiore they're
(CARI).
So is CARI active in Portland? Yes, says
Jennifer Lynch of
“When
[ICE]
arrested and o ffic ia lly
ICE..
the technology
launched CARI, the
ICE spokesman for the Seattle field office
watchdog group the charged w ith crimes and
thing was very hush,
Andrew Muñoz confirmed CARI was in
Electronic Frontier
therefore represent a clear
hush. It all happened
effect in the Portland-metro area. Muñoz did
.Foundation (EFF).
behind closed doors,”
v io la tio n ©f the rig h t to
Lynch’s group
says Jacinta Gonzalqz, not elaborate on what this meant in
. privacy, f
has been tracking
an organizer with the i, practice.
Maria Miranda-Olivares.
“ICE .does not conduct sweeps or raids to
law enforcement’s t - ,
New Orleans
In March 2012, Miranda-Olivares was
target, undocumented immigrants
including ICE’s - .
Workers’ Center for
arrested for violating a domestic violence
indiscriminately. Characterizing the
use of devices that ’
restraining order. She was taken to the
- Criminal Alien Removal Initiative as
read biometrics - unique biological markers Racial Justice (NOWCRJ).
Clackamas County Jail where her
NOWCRJ is an advocacy group formed to
anything other than a strategy to focus»
from fingerprints and facial recognition to
fingerprints were scanned and shared with
protect the rights of immigrant workers
existing enforcement resources on
.; :
iris scans - as a way to track individuals.
who helped rebuild New Orleans following
an ICE database, which showed she was m
apprehending criminal alien fugitives would
Lynch says her group has uncovered a
Hurricane Katrina. In December 2013,
the U.S. illegally. ICE then requested the
notbe accurate,” Muñoz wrote in an, e-mail.
laundry list of examples where biometric
NOWCRJ published a comprehensive report
jail hold'her.
'
Muñoz turned down Street Roots’ request
devices are being used on immigrants in
detailing CARI’s activities in the New
Jail officers informed Miranda-Olivares
for a phone interview with Nathalie Asher,
ways the American public would never
that even if she made bail, the jail would .
Orleans metro ,area.
' tolerate if they were used that same way on
director of the Seattle field office. He
ICE’s website makes no reference to
still be obligated to detain her for ICE. But
responded to some, but not all, of our
» U.S. citizens. .
in her April court ruling, .U.S. Magistrate
CARI.
questions by email.
Judge Janice Stewart wrote the jail was
Gonzalez says CARI came to the
Street Roots was unable to locate reports
attention
of
NOWCRJ
when
IGE
accidentally
Data
Before
the
Crime
under no such obligation.
similar to -New Orleans in Portland. In fact,
included
a
document
mentioning
the
Stewart ruled ICE holds are just requests
many who spoke with Street Roots for this
program in a trove of papers following the
and county jails are not legally required to
In its 2012 study, the EFF reported the
story hadn’t heard of CARI. This was true of
■ release of Erhn San Martin Gomez, a
honor them, b u t the judge went a step
Los Angeles Police Department was using
officials at the Multnomah and Washington
NOWCRJ
member
who,
on
Sept.
11,
2013,
further in her, ruling. Stewart ruled these
mobile fingerprint scanners to track day
County Sheriff’s .Departments and most
had his fingerprints scanned before: he was
holds were a form of prolonged detention
laborers in the city. The workers had not
local activists.
; v
that violated Miranda-Olivares’ rights. lhe
been charged or arrested for crimes prior to arrested in front of his apartment in
The Clackamas County Sheriff’s
Jefferson Parish outside New Orleans.
ruling’s effects spread quickly across
having their data collected, raising the
Department didn’t return our e-mails or
Gomez reported that the officers who
Oregon as jail after jail stopped honoring
question of the legality of the search,
phone calls.
arrested him had identified him as being m
according to the EFF.
, , -
ICE holds.
Active or not, local immigrant advocates
the country illegally after first handcuffing
The EFF’s source was the LAPD s own
Today, at least 30 Oregon counties \
say they’ve got tiieir eyes on ICE, especially
him
and
then
scanning
his
fingerprints
including Multnomah, Washington, and
website. The URL cited in the EFF report
since the Miranda-Olivares decision.
using a portable biometric reader. Soon
Clackamas - have stopped honoring ICE
“Since ICE holds are no more, I think
has since been removed.
holds. And roughly 11 Washington state, 16
NOWCRJ started to hear similar reports
The EFB has also been tracking use of
they [ICE] might go back to the raids of the
from
others
who
had
been
stopped,
scanned
Colorado, and several California counties
the Mobile Offender Recognition and
past or will come up with a different
and arrested using the devices.
Information System, MORIS, a device that
have followed suit.
.
strategy. But we don’t know what that
If
this
all
sounds
sophisticated
and
high-
But as county jails alter their policies,
along with reading faces can also read
tech, Gonzalez says it wasn’.t really.
activists nervously await ICE’s next move,
human irises. The legality oj using facial
See ICE, p a g e 7
According to the eyewitness reports of
one that many suspect will include the
recognition is still in question and hasn’t
increased usd of devices that can read
been tested in the courts.
“W e h a v e a