Presentation to the Anaheim City Council to end Anaheim Police Department cooperation with the INS at the APD Detention Facility (Reconquista wants the cops not to enforce the law)
By Nativo V. López
National Co-Director of Hermandad Mexicana Nacional
Anaheim, California
February 13, 2001
Mayor Tom Daly and City Council of the city of Anaheim, my
name is Nativo
Vigil López. I am the National Co-Director of the 
Hermandad Mexicana
Nacional, a nonprofit membership organization of mutual aid
and assistance for the Spanish-speaking immigrant worker and
families. I am of the eighth generation of indigenous inhabitants
of what is today considered the southwest of the United States.
My family's relatives tiled the soil and ran cattle in Texas,
New Mexico, and Colorado, when the land still belonged to Mexico,
and comprised the northern territories of New Spain under the
colonial rule of the Spanish Crown, the same land that bore fruit
for centuries to the Chichimecas in a period when the area was
known as Aztlan.
These are my historical ancestors and I am of that stock. My
family has fought and died in every major war waged by the governments
of the United States from 1824 to the present. They fought alongside
Sam Houston in Texas in pursuit of a territorial separation from
Mexico, and they fought under the military authority of General
Santa Ana to prevent such separation. My family wore the uniforms
of both the blue and gray during the United States Civil War.
They rode with Teddy Roosevelt's Rough Riders up San Juan Hill
in the Spanish-American War. They spilled blood on European soil
during World War I. They were among the first to enlist in the
fight against fascism, nazism, and Japanese militarism in World
War II. My father was the recipient of two Purple Hearts, which
he displays with great pride. I had the pleasure to tour Europe
with my father in 1996 to visit the locations where he fought
and was wounded on two occasions. My father is a proud veteran
paratrooper of the 17th Division of the US Army, a participant
in the Battle of the Bulge, one of the largest military mobilizations
in the history of the world that ultimately broke the back of
German fascism. My father is a survivor of the Battle of Baston,
a beautiful pastoral city of Belgium where US troops were holed-up
and encircled by German forces and given an ultimatum to surrender
or die. The response from my father's commanding officer to this
ultimatum, at a point of the most desperate and dire conditions
of impending doom for the young US soldiers, was NUTS. Shortly,
thereafter, General George Patton broke the German encirclement,
and the rest is history. (Footnote
- comment on everything that appears after the mention of 'Aztlan')
I come before you on behalf of our constituency of immigrant families and the Latino community of this fair city of Anaheim, which now comprises more than fifty percent of the resident taxpayers, in memory of Bert Corona, a lifelong advocate for the rights of immigrants, particularly Mexican and Latino, the founder and former National Director of the Hermandad Mexicana Nacional, who passed from this earth on January 15th of this year. I am accompanied by Marcela Gomez Duque, a young mother and resident of Anaheim, the most recent victim of the unfair and unjust policy for which we make our presence known here today before you, and formally petition you as the representatives of our local government.
I am referring to the policy enacted by the City Council of Anaheim in September, 1995, which directed the Police Department to conduct a screening process to establish the immigration status of all arrestees booked into the Temporary Detention Facility. Subsequently, a 6-month I.N.S. screening "Pilot Project" was initiated in the Anaheim Temporary Detention Facility in which I.N.S. agents interviewed arrestees prior to arraignment and established their immigration status. Today, their exist a full-blown cooperation between the local police department and the Immigration and Naturalization Service under the legal auspices of the INS Prearraignment Criminal Alien Identification Program, which resulted from HR 1493, for the purpose of ascertaining legal status of individuals detained for the lightest of infractions, including vehicle related infractions, and truly misdemeanor and felony offenses, and the physical removal of such individuals determined not to have legal status.
It should be stated that the city of Anaheim was the originator and an innovator of such a policy. In fact, Anaheim implemented this policy prior to the existence of federal legislation and the existing federal statue. However, there is nothing in the federal statue that actually requires cities to participate in this program. It is completely voluntary and left to municipal discretion. Ninety percent of the cities of Orange County do not participate in this program. This policy, while seemingly benign and well-intentioned, has opened Pandora's Box and invited such crazed proposals, the likes of which you received on January 23rd of this year, to permit unrestrained and flagrant street-level cooperation between local police officers and the INS authorities. This is tantamount to deputizing the local police as INS agents to detain any individual suspected of not possessing legal resident status. In fact, there once existed a time when this was common and general practice.
And while the practice is not completely common today nor directed by any enacted policy, municipal or otherwise, to our present knowledge, yesterday, the Los Angeles Times revealed that, in fact, this practice is still current in a number of local police departments in Orange County. This practice consist of local police officers detaining individuals for innocuous offenses and physically transporting them to facilities of the US Border Patrol in complete violation of their constitutional and civil rights. This is nothing short of racial profiling of the worst kind and local police officers actually acting outside of the law.
We don't doubt the good intentions of this City Council and other residents of Anaheim to curtail criminal activity in our midst. Our community has raised its voice the loudest over the years to receive adequate and equitable police services in the most difficult of neighborhoods. We would contend that we are still not adequately and equitably served and represented. We know better than most residents about the harm and danger of the criminal element that preys on the productive members of society. We know best because we are among the majority of the victims of such criminal activity.
But we also know best, and firsthand, about racial profiling. We know only too well that racial minorities, persons of color, non-English fluent-speaking residents are typically and historically targeted for detention and arrest at disproportionate rates to their numbers in a given community. Yes, we are the experts in this field. Therefore, we expect that you respect our opinions and observations regarding the matter, and proceed accordingly.
We stand before you today to formally petition our government. We formally request that you put an end to the present policy which permits local police department cooperation with the INS at the Anaheim Detention Facility. We firmly believe that four year's practice and experimentation are more than sufficient to conclude that, while perhaps well-intentioned, the disadvantages and harm of such a policy far outweigh any benefits to our community. We believe a reasonable timeline to wind-down the operational aspects of the program would be thirty days. In the meantime, our expectation is that no more individuals be turned over to the INS by police officers of the Anaheim Police Department for interrogation. This practice must end now.
I know this is a difficult decision for the City Council. I pray that you have the courage to do the right thing. On the other hand, it is only right that we make you aware of our intentions to pursue our petition to its ultimate consequence. We will return within the thirty days. We are hopeful that you heed our counsel, accept our petition, and act accordingly. It is our sincere desire to not pursue superior levels of action to gain your attention, respect, and corresponding response. Thank you.