This is the third in a series of articles exploring different perspectives of illegal immigration.
Utah is not considered to be a border state, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have immigration problems, especially southern Utah and Cedar City.
Cedar City Police Detective Sgt. Jerry Womack said the police department doesn't deal with immigration often only because it doesn't have the manpower for it.
"We don't go looking for it," he said. "We are busy working on other things."
Iron County Sheriff Mark Gower said the sheriff's department doesn't deal with illegal immigrants too often, because they rely mostly on Immigration and Customs Enforcement in St. George.
Both Womack and Gower said the most common illegal immigrants area that law enforcement deals with are the result of traffic stops.
"It's not weekly," Gower said. "We call ICE whenever we encounter traffic stops."
Womack said the police department will run into a few problems with illegal immigrants when they stop crimes.
After area law enforcement encounters illegal immigrants through traffic stops or any other crime problem, they call the ICE office in St. George, who then sends an agent to get the suspect, Gower said.
"We do pull over van-fulls," he said.
When ICE picks up an illegal immigrant, the person is kept in St. George until he or she can be bussed back to the border, Gower said.
"We do pull over van-fulls," he said.
When ICE picks up an illegal immigrant, the person is kept in St. George until he or she can be bussed back to the border, Gower said.
Womack said both area law enforcement and ICE run into problems because both are understaffed and can't catch all of the illegal immigrants.
"There are so many (illegal immigrants) and we're so busy," he said. "Our jails are so crowded; we can't just arrest them."
While neither the police department nor the sheriff's department keep statistics and can't give an estimate of how many illegal immigrant situations they deal with, Womack said the police department runs into its "fair share" of illegal immigrants.
"It has definitely increased (over the last few years)," Gower said.
If area law enforcement happens upon an illegal immigrant and there are no criminal charges, that person is expected to go with ICE in St. George when they can pick him or her up. If criminal charges are present, however, the person will be kept in the area until the charges have been sorted out, Gower said.
When dealing with business and illegal immigrants, whether the person is working without documentation or whatever the case may be, Gower said area law enforcement has no authority.
"The federal ICE agents handle that," he said. "It is out of our jurisdiction to go to businesses."
ICE deals not only with employment issues dealing with immigration, it deals with a large "multitude" of areas in association with immigration and the laws, said Virginia Kice, Western Regional communications director and spokesperson for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
"Our job is not to randomly target people," she said. "There are a multitude of different things. We're focusing on the broad array (of immigration issues)."
ICE has intelligence and lead-driven investigations to enforce the laws instead of the stereotypical "walk down the street and look someone in the eye and identify them as an illegal immigrant," which would be racial profiling and "just asking for a law suit," Kice said.
ICE tries to improve public safety, Kice said. Illegal immigration is important to the community and could put the nation at risk, so ICE deals mostly with those who violate legal immigration laws.
"We want to restore the integrity and protect the nation," she said.
In order to protect the nation from illegal immigrants that could present a threat to the nation, ICE tries to stop the "criminal aliens," like those in street gangs, sex offenders or even those involved with human smuggling, Kice said.
One thing ICE has done to better protect the public from threats of illegal immigration is to partner with local law enforcements and train in how to better implement a working communication between area law enforcement and ICE offices, Kice said.
"There is no one-size-fits-all; each partnership is different," she said. "We recognize that the local law enforcements should not be responsible, but we find a common ground to promote public safely."
ICE is a national organization dealing with immigration law enforcement, but has offices in Salt Lake City, Orem, Ogden and St. George, Kice said.
"Efforts in Utah are very effective," she said. "We have finite resources, that's why we partner with local law enforcement."
Kice said the area law enforcement does not enforce the immigration laws, which are complex. Instead, they communicate with nearby ICE agents.
"They have to be cautious," she said. "We don't want to deter the community from reporting anything."
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