Tag: ICE

Jul 30

2025

Another bad review for ICE’s Batavia detention center

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For a third time in the past two years, federal inspectors have found that guards at the local ICE detention center in Batavia improperly used force against the immigrants held there. Investigative Post in February reported on two recent federal audits that found incidents where officers were quick to use pepper spray and manhandle detainees instead of deescalating tense situations. Now, a June report from the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general found two additional instances where guards violated the use-of-force policy against detainees. On one occasion, a detainee was locked in his cell, handcuffed. Officers arrived to remove the[...]

Posted 6 months ago

Jul 22

2025

Migrant crossings on our northern border

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Border patrol surveillance cameras at Fort Niagara State Park. Photo by Tina MacIntyre-Yee/Democrat and Chronicle. By the time four people paddled halfway across the Niagara River in an inflatable raft one night in 2024, a surveillance camera had already picked them out of the winter darkness. The image was gray and pixelated, their raft a single speck of black in the mouth of the river. Several miles away, a U.S. Border Patrol agent sat behind a dozen or more monitors and counted as four people stepped onto land. The camera followed the migrants to the shore in Lewiston, while agents[...]

Posted 6 months ago

Jul 17

2025

Latinos, roofers are prime ICE targets in WNY

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An ICE raid took place on Crescent Avenue in May. Photo submitted. Rather than targeting the “worst of the worst,” as the Trump administration claims, ICE agents in Western New York are primarily arresting immigrants with no criminal history. Data shows that more than three-quarters of migrants arrested in Western New York since President Trump took office have no criminal record.  To date, most of the 335 detainees are from Latin American counties, a significant percentage of them roofers and others in the construction field. By contrast, ICE arrested a total of 84 in Western New York all of last[...]

Posted 7 months ago

Jul 16

2025

ICE deception on immigrant detentions

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On X, ICE has used these words to describe detainees who were already incarcerated. Graphic by I’Jaz Ja’ciel. Since Donald Trump took office in January, the Buffalo ICE office has issued a steady drumbeat of press releases and social media posts purporting to show that its agents are taking dangerous criminals “off the streets.” But in reality, more than half of the immigrants ICE Buffalo has publicized since Trump’s inauguration were already in state or federal prison. Following a White House-issued quota, ICE data shows that arrests in the region have skyrocketed from 83 last year to 335 through the[...]

Posted 7 months ago

Jul 1

2025

ICE targets Iranian family in Buffalo here legally

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The corner of West Delavan Ave. and Greenwood Pl. on Buffalo’s West Side. Photo by J. Dale Shoemaker. For nearly a week, immigration agents in Buffalo have targeted a block on the city’s West Side, seeking to detain an Iranian man living there. The man is in the United States legally. He has no criminal history, no warrant for his arrest and regularly checks in with immigration officials as part of his asylum case. He’s seeking to stay in the country permanently with his son after having fled persecution in Iran for his political activity. Since Wednesday, agents believed to[...]

Posted 7 months ago

Jun 20

2025

Feds seeking to deport sickle cell patient over theft

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U.S. immigration officials are seeking to deport to Venezuela a 20-year-old migrant living in Buffalo and suffering from sickle cell disease because he has been accused of shoplifting at the Walden Galleria Mall. A spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Border Protection told Investigative Post the charge of shoplifting “nullifies” Anderson Contreras-Hernandez’s legal status and, under the newly enacted Laken Riley Act, means he must be detained by immigration authorities. To date, he has not been convicted of any crime. The spokesperson described Contreras-Hernandez as “amenable to deportation.” His attorneys, in a lawsuit filed Tuesday, have appealed to U.S. District Judge[...]

Posted 8 months ago

Jun 17

2025

Feds won’t retrieve wrongfully deported migrant

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Jordin Melgar-Salmeron. Photo submitted. Jordin Melgar-Salmeron, the Salvadoran man long detained in Batavia and deported to his home country last month in violation of a federal court order, is allowed to return to the United States. But only if he can get to the border himself. That’s the position the Trump administration has taken in the case, according to recent court filings reviewed by Investigative Post. Melgar-Salmeron’s attorneys are demanding the government actively facilitate his return, as it did for Kilmar Abrego Garcia, another Salvadoran man deported in violation of a court order whose case has gained wide attention. Following[...]

Posted 8 months ago

Jun 13

2025

Feds adding migrant detention centers in Buffalo area

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U.S. immigration agencies have expanded their footprint in Western New York, detaining arrested migrants in five locations beyond the federal detention center in Batavia.  One reason for the detentions: The ICE facility in Batavia has been periodically near or over capacity in recent months and cannot house women or children, according to advocates for detainees.  In the Town of Tonawanda,  23 immigrants have been detained for the past 10 days at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection station located at 600 Colvin Woods Parkway. A Customs and Border Protection spokesperson  confirmed those detentions Wednesday. The station is in an office[...]

Posted 8 months ago
Investigative Post