Immigrants’ Suit: Home Raids Violated our Rights

http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3644

Ten http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=1208 yesterday charged that warrantless and abusive pre-dawn raids by federal authorities violated their constitutional rights.

The http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3937, in a federal lawsuit, asserted that ranking Homeland Security officials ordered agents to meet arrest quotes but failed to provide proper training or current addresses for people they were seeking.

The lawsuit, which seeks unspecified monetary damages, described eight raids in which agents displayed weapons, and sometimes shouted obscenities. In one case, an agent put a gun against a woman’s chest and told her to “go back to (her) http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3852 country,” according to the lawsuit.

According to the lawsuit, agents rebuffed the efforts of at least one lawful resident, Maria Argueta of North Bergen, to show them her documentation and she was detained for nearly 36 hours. “Our complaint shows that what happened to our plaintiffs in the middle of the night was not exceptional. It was part of a routine, widespread practice, condoned at the highest levels of government, that tramples the rights of citizens and non-citizens alike,” said Bassina Farbenblum, a lawyer at the Seton Hall Center for Social Justice. The center filed the lawsuit on behalf of the immigrants along with a Roseland law firm, Lowenstein Sandler.

A lawyer at the firm, Scott Thompson, said, “None of the home raids in today’s case involved valid warrants allowing the agents to enter, and none of the residents gave consent.”

http://www.nj.com/news/jjournal/index.ssf?/base/news-0/120728854469350.xml&coll=3

2008-04-05