ICE agents take 2 more people into custody from SLO County Jail
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents took at least two people into custody from the San Luis Obispo County Jail on Tuesday morning, according to video footage taken by the 805 Immigrant Rapid Response Network.
A blue Ford Expedition entered the jail parking lot at about 7:40 p.m., then a second Ford Expedition arrived at about 8 a.m., 805 UndocuFund community organizer Cesar Vasquez told The Tribune.
Four ICE agents wearing sunglasses and masks that covered most of their faces exited the vehicles. Two of those agents wore vests that said “ICE.”
One ICE agent held what appeared to be a canister of bear spray, which he pointed at the rapid responders multiple times, Vasquez said.
Three agents entered the lobby and waited for inmates to be released.
The first inmate was released into the lobby at about 8:07 a.m. and the other was released at 8:10 a.m.
In both instances, the three ICE agents surrounded the inmate, bound their wrists, then led them to the Ford Expeditions, an anonymous rapid responder who witnessed the incidents told The Tribune.
The Tribune does not have the names of the inmates who were taken into ICE custody.
ICE did not communicate with the Sheriff’s Office about its plan to take those two inmates into custody, agency spokesperson Tony Cipolla told The Tribune.
“We believe they took people into custody that had been released,” he said in a statement. “We did not communicate with ICE about them. ICE was acting independently.”
Senate Bill 54, the California Values Act, prohibits local law enforcement from detaining people at the request of ICE or transferring most inmates to ICE custody. The law does have exceptions for inmates with federal arrest warrants or those who have been convicted of certain crimes, including assault with a deadly weapon, arson, domestic violence, sale of narcotics, criminal threats, vehicular manslaughter or felony vandalism.
When an inmate has a qualifying conviction or federal arrest warrant, the Sheriff’s Office will allow ICE to enter the jail’s sally port, and then deputies will hand over the inmate, Sheriff Ian Parkinson said at a League of Women Voters webinar earlier this month.
The Sheriff’s Office did not release any inmates to ICE in the sally port on Tuesday, Cipolla told The Tribune.
This isn’t the first time ICE took people into custody from the jail. On Oct. 22, ICE took three men into custody who were released into the jail lobby.
During the League of Women Voters webinar, Parkinson said ICE could use court records to independently figure out what day an inmate will be released from jail.
“If an incarcerated person is taken to court in the morning, and the judge releases that person, at some point, they return to the jail. They’re processed and released,” Parkinson said at the time, noting that ICE could wait in the lobby for the inmate’s release.
All inmates are released into the lobby when they’ve posted bail or completed their sentence, Parkinson said. The Sheriff’s Office will not tell ICE officers to leave if they’re sitting in the lobby, he said.
Vasquez, however, questioned the timing of Tuesday’s release and ICE’s arrival.
“What’s really suspicious for us is that the public information gives a rough estimate of when someone will be released. But those ICE agents arrived, and within 15 to 20 minutes, the individuals got released,” he said. “They either got lucky, or someone alerted them.”
After the ICE agents ushered one inmate to the vehicles, a rapid responder asked the ICE agent holding what appeared to be bear spray for his name and badge number. He refused to answer, according to video footage provided to The Tribune.
“Am I arresting you, lady?” he said. “Then you don’t need to know.”
She asked him again to identify himself, and the pair got into a brief argument — where she called him a kidnapper, and he called her a liar.
“Are you here to document — which is your right,” he said. “Then document and be quiet.”
The ICE agents drove away without further incident.
Later on Tuesday morning, volunteers with the 805 Immigrant Rapid Response Network saw those two inmates who were taken into custody at the jail unloaded at the Santa Maria ICE Facility, Vasquez said.
