LOCAL

Trump's order sparks fears in SW Florida that even traffic offenders may be deported

Alexi C. Cardona, and Patrick Riley
Naples Daily News

Just hours after President Donald Trump issued his executive order expanding the country’s immigration enforcement priorities Jan. 25, a Collier County Sheriff’s Office deputy pulled over a 2005 Chrysler van in East Naples.

The deputy had checked the van’s license plate and realized its registered owner had an expired driver’s license. Behind the wheel was Ana Mentado Contador, 32, a Mexican national and mother of two.

In this Nov. 4, 2016, file photo, Donald Trump speaks in Hershey, Pa. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, File)

When the deputy pulled Contador over on Great Blue Drive and asked for her license, she told him it had expired years ago. He arrested her on a charge of driving with an expired license for more than six months — a misdemeanor.

Contador spent the next two weeks in a Collier jail, was assigned a public defender, pleaded no contest, was told she had served her time and ordered to pay court costs.

But at 9 a.m. Feb. 10, Contador was taken from the jail to the Krome Detention Center, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center 24 miles west of Miami.

Related story: Trump plans to ramp up deportations

Soon afterward, she was taken to the Broward Transitional Center, where she now might face deportation.

Ana Mentado Contador

Contador had no prior arrests. A Naples police officer cited her in 2014 for driving with an expired license, and Contador paid a fine.

“You don’t see a lot of expired-license cases trigger ICE holds,” said Sal Bazaz, Contador’s public defender.

“The fact that someone is in danger of getting deported for minor charges like driving with an expired license says that this is going to become a huge issue,” Bazaz said.

Contador, of East Naples, is likely the first Collier resident to be arrested and face deportation under Trump’s expanded deportation priorities.

Trump's deportation priorities define a “removable alien” as someone who has been charged with “any criminal offense,” even if he or she has not been convicted, or someone who has committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense.

Contador likely would not have been a deportation priority under President Barack Obama's guidelines, issued in 2014, “unless there was some other federal interest” in her beyond that specific arrest, Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Karie Partington confirmed.

Contador's exact status could not be determined. Partington said deputies use ICE databases to determine an inmate's immigration status and referred questions to ICE.

ICE spokeswoman Tammy Spicer could not discuss specifics of the case but said, "No person will be deported without full due process from the court system."

Related story: Trump immigration raids show greater focus on non-criminals

Trump’s executive order “opens the door for almost anyone to be considered a priority,” said Judy Rabinovitz, deputy director for the American Civil Liberty Union’s Immigrants’ Rights Project.

“It’s very broad,” she said. “Anything goes. So I think that’s what’s so scary.”

Contador always could have been deported, Rabinovitz said, but she likely wouldn’t have been a priority under the previous administration's deportation guidelines.

The Obama administration's guidelines focused on removing those who committed felonies or were habitual misdemeanor offenders.

“It’s not that the Obama years were so great,” Rabinovitz said. “There was a lot of enforcement and a lot of people being deported, but this is much more just anything goes.”

In Collier County, some deputies have been delegated the responsibilities of immigration officers.

Related story: Trump says he'll issue new immigration ban next week

In 2007, the Sheriff’s Office entered into a partnership with ICE known as 287(g). That partnership allows deputies — under federal supervision — to interrogate arrested immigrants about their status and prepare documents to start the process that may lead to their deportation.

The Collier jail houses inmates with immigration holds after they post bail or serve their sentences for indefinite lengths of time until ICE can take them into custody.

The Sheriff’s Office, which renewed its agreement with ICE last year, is one of two Florida law enforcement agencies that participates in the program.

Nationally, about 40 agencies and corrections departments have partnered with ICE.

Supporters of the program, including Collier Sheriff Kevin Rambosk, say it keeps communities safe by removing criminals.

Rambosk said a case such as Contador’s, though relatively minor, still warrants enforcement.

Collier County Sheriff Kevin Rambosk.

“I don’t get to make that choice or decision,” Rambosk said. “There are different priorities of criminal activity. Obviously, this is a lower priority, in my opinion.”

However, Rambosk said, ICE ultimately decides where to route people.

If during the intake process at the jail there is a question about whether someone is in the country illegally, deputies trained under 287(g) start the process of verifying the inmate’s immigration status.

If deputies find sufficient information to recommend a detainer, the sheriff said, they’ll prepare an initial detainer.

“But ultimately, ICE approves or disapproves the recommendation of the detainer,” Rambosk said. “We can’t do it on our own absent ICE.”

Rambosk said the contract and partnership with ICE benefits the public safety and that deputies are working to remove more dangerous criminals, regardless of nationality.

“Certainly the more violent, high-priority offenders, whether they’re illegally present foreign nationals or U.S. citizens, that’s who we always want to get off the street,” Rambosk said.

Related story: 100 years and 16 presidents ago, a look at another anti-immigration act

The sheriff said traffic safety and enforcement is a “critically important element” to him.

“It’s hard to distinguish with the immigration question, but as far as a traffic question, traffic enforcement and violations is a top priority,” Rambosk said. “That’s the way I’m looking at it.

"We’re going to enforce the traffic laws and any other law fairly, equitably across the board," he said.

"Could you run into someone of a lower priority that winds up having to go through the immigration system under the current policy? I would say yes, there is that potential.”

But critics say 287(g) fosters fear among immigrant communities, can lead to racial profiling and makes people afraid to report crimes.

“A lot of local police have spoken out against this and said, ‘It’s very bad for local policing because it creates confusion among the community as to where the interest of the police department lies,’ ” Rabinovitz said. “It creates distrust in the community.”

It can create panic, too.

Related story: What you need to know about Trump's immigration plan

Barbara Mainster, an immigration advocate who has worked with the Redlands Christian Migrant Association for 45 years, said people in Immokalee are afraid to take their children to school, drive or be out of their homes at night.

Advocates are hosting classes to help undocumented immigrants understand their rights and explaining what to do if authorities are at their doors.

“People are living in fear,” Mainster said. “They want to get documentation. They’re preparing themselves. They want a power of attorney so if they’re deported, someone can take care of their children and the kids aren’t placed in foster care.”

Attorneys in Collier County think immigrant families in Southwest Florida are going to have a difficult time. They say the expanded deportation priorities could lead to major detention cases and multiply the number of people typically defended in immigration cases.

Bazaz, Contador's public defender, said he likely will start working with immigration attorneys more when defending undocumented people facing criminal charges.

In Contador’s case, Bazaz said, a deputy likely checked her plates in traffic and determined the registered van owner’s license was expired. The deputy likely drove next to Contador to determine whether the driver appeared to be the same person as the registered owner and pulled her over.

“The family had a lot of questions about how this could have happened because she didn’t commit a traffic violation,” Bazaz said. “I had to explain to them that everything the officer did was valid.

"What they wanted me to do was get her out of the jail as soon as possible so she could resolve the immigration case and hopefully come back home.”

In general, undocumented immigrants in Florida are not able to obtain a driver's license. It used to be a possibility until a new law went into effect a few years ago.

Attempts to reach Contador's family at their home and by phone were unsuccessful.

Related story: What to do if immigration officers come knocking at your door

Matus Varga, an immigration attorney working with Bazaz to defend a Collier County man facing deportation after a misdemeanor battery arrest, said ICE used to not always pick up inmates on an immigration hold within a 48-hour window. But now the agency is taking all inmates who are on hold, Varga said.

“The enforcement is more now than it used to be,” Varga said.

Varga said it would be difficult to defend his client because the man has no family here.

Varga said families can apply for a stay of deportation that allows the person facing removal to stay in the U.S. legally for a year with a work permit. The paperwork can be refiled every year.

Renata Calderaro, an immigration lawyer in Fort Lauderdale, said the fact Contador has children could help her be released on bond until she can go before an immigration judge.

She also would have to show she is not a flight risk and that she is no danger to the community, Calderaro said.

“For bond, it may work,” she said. “But then past that, there would be a lot of factors that would have to be reviewed.”

One factor, Calderaro said, would be if one of Contador’s children has a medical condition that can be treated only in the U.S. and she can show she would need to stay for her child’s well-being.

However, Contador will have to pay for her own lawyer, Calderaro said, since public defenders are not available for immigration cases.

If she can’t, she will have to hope a lawyer takes the case pro bono. Otherwise, she will have to represent herself, she said.

A year or year and a half can pass from arrest until a final decision is made, Calderaro said.

Related story: Across the USA: Protests, closures on a #DayWithoutImmigrants

In general, those without criminal records are sent to the Broward Transitional Center, Calderaro said. People with histories of arrests are detained at Krome.

Calderaro said Contador’s case is not unusual and similar ones happened under previous administrations, too.

“This happens all the time, unfortunately,” she said. “I do think that it’s more likely to happen. And I think that it’s just now out in the open, where I think that under previous administrations, it was happening but people just weren’t talking about it.”

Trump on Thursday discussed his immigration order at a news conference.

"We've begun a nationwide effort to remove criminal aliens, gang members and others who pose a threat to public safety,” he said. “We are saving American lives every single day."

Staff writer Maria Perez contributed to this report.