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Federal officials announced Friday they had
arrested 370 immigrants who were in the U.S. illegally or convicted
of other crimes as part of a three-day roundup in the Midwest.

 Those arrested were legal immigrants with convictions that made
them eligible for deportation, illegal immigrants who had been
convicted of other crimes, immigration fugitives wanted for being
in the country illegally or people who had been deported and come
back.


  "These are not people we want freely roaming our streets,"
said John Morton, director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement Agency.


      The operation involving local law enforcement and federal
agencies ended Thursday. Arrests were made in Illinois, Indiana,
Iowa, Wisconsin, Kansas, Missouri, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska
and Ohio, officials said.


      The immigrants arrested were from more than 50 countries, and
some had been convicted of crimes involving drugs and sexual
offenses, ICE said. The countries spanned the globe, including
Iraq, India, Kenya, Syria, Togo, Bosnia, Canada and Vietnam, Morton
said.


      It was the latest in series of similar enforcement operations
ICE has been conducting around the country since last year.


      "We will not tolerate those who come here unlawfully and take
to a life of crime," Morton said.


      Darryl McPherson, the U.S. marshal for the northern district of
Illinois, said there are often misconceptions about enforcement
actions.


      "We don't target individuals, we target crimes. We pursue
fugitives for the crimes they commit, not for the gender or race
they represent," McPherson said.


      On another matter, Morton said some immigration cases had been
dismissed when they involved people who were eligible for an
immigration benefit like asylum, a green card or were married to an
American citizen.


      "It's a waste of government resources to pursue an immigration
removal proceeding against somebody who's likely going to be
granted a benefit to stay in the country," he said.


      Morton said a review of such cases was going on nationwide. He
dismissed the suggestion that dismissing them was any type of
backdoor amnesty.

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Federal officials announced Friday they had
arrested 370 immigrants who were in the U.S. illegally or convicted
of other crimes as part of a three-day roundup in the Midwest.


Feds arrest 370 criminal immigrants in Midwest bust

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