Mesa police could join immigration war

Mesa will pursue an effort to cross-train police officers in its jails to flag and help deport illegal immigrants arrested for criminal offenses.

In a symbolic move, the City Council agreed Thursday to send a letter to Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff, asking when Mesa officers could be trained to act as immigration officers.

“The inability of Congress to enact meaningful immigration reform has left cities like Mesa with no alternative but to seek local solutions,” the letter states.

The council’s move is a reversal from a year ago, when it backed off a proposal to cross-train officers in immigration law and enact local ordinances to crack down on people loitering on street corners while looking for work.

However, in recent weeks, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio has sent teams of deputies to Mesa that have pulled people over for traffic violations and asked about the violators’ citizenship status.

Meanwhile, Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon has been considering changing a long-standing police policy that bars officers from asking about the immigration status of people they arrest.

Mesa’s policy would not include police officers on patrol questioning a person’s citizenship status.

Mesa officials talked Thursday about cross-training less than 10 officers who would serve in the city’s detention facilities.

Police Chief George Gascón said Thursday “liability” increases when officers on patrol are enforcing immigration laws without supervision from federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers.

A year ago, Gascón said people in Mesa could be deterred from reporting crimes if they feared they could be deported for doing so, and that the department didn’t have the resources to enforce federal law.

Gascón said he has been pushing for cross-training officers to serve in the city’s holding facilities since September. He said he would not support cross-training officers only for arresting people based on their immigration status.

“I think the problem with patrol is that you have to be extremely careful about how it is implemented,” he said. “We have to have the trust of the communities that we serve.”

Gascón and Arpaio have been publicly feuding in recent weeks over Arpaio’s immigration law enforcement efforts in Mesa.

Vice Mayor Claudia Walters, running for mayor, said Mesa’s strategy on enforcing immigration law is one of practicality.

“We thought that the place to have the highest level of impact is to do this in the jails,” Walters said.

Leaders in Mesa’s immigrant community said the recent crackdown on immigration has scared Hispanics.

“People feel it’s unfair,” said Magdalena Schwartz, director of the Mesa-based Latino Community Services, which helps people obtain green cards and citizenship. “They have a lot of fear. They are afraid to go shopping. ... They’re afraid to go to the grocery store and to take their children to school.”

She said the push to have police identify illegal immigrants could force law enforcement to pull resources away from more serious crimes.

Mesa police have cultivated a good relationship with the immigrant community, which could be jeopardized if Mesa shifts its policy, she said.

“If the police department wants to work with immigration we cannot invite them to our forums anymore,” she said. “We would not be able to trust them anymore.”

Councilman Scott Somers said the city hasn’t been doing a good job of detailing Mesa’s enforcement effort on illegal immigration.

Arrests at drop houses and motels catering to illegal immigrants have led to cooperation with ICE and hundreds of deportations of those involved in criminal activity.

“It was defined today,” Somers said. “The criminal — those are the ones we have to go after.”

Currently, the federal program to cross-train officers in immigration law is unfunded.

Somers said if the city was successful in its request, officers in jails could be cross-trained as early as the next budget year, which begins this summer.

He said he supports cross-training officers in the field, although the city has made no formal move to do that.

Cross-trained officers could be assigned to the SWAT team, an investigation team and DUI checkpoints.