Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested 86 undocumented immigrants, including some in North Texas, in a three-day operation, which ended last Thursday. 11 people were arrested in Dallas, three in Fort Worth, two in Denton, and one apiece in Garland, McKinney, and Grand Prairie.
Another 16 arrests were made in Oklahoma. Other areas affected included East Texas and the Texas Panhandle. Bret Bradford, the Dallas field office director for ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations division, said that the operation targeted criminal aliens and immigration fugitives in the state of Oklahoma and North Texas. He noted that operations are also carried out on a daily basis. Bradford said that ICE’s removal of criminal immigrants from the streets improves public safety and is a valuable community service.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the majority of those taken into custody came from Latin America, with 10 from Guatemala, and as many as 55 from Mexico. Others arrested came from Honduras, Cameroon, Laos, Liberia, Panama, Zimbabwe, El Salvador, Bangladesh, Jordan, Nigeria, and the Philippines. 82 of the 86 arrested were men, 55 of whom had criminal convictions, and 21 had been deported from the US before, the agency claims.
The ages of those taken into custody ranged from 19 to 61. In Dallas, a 57-year-old Bangladesh citizen was arrested, convicted of manufacturing and delivering drugs in 2017, and is now in custody awaiting a federal immigration court hearing.