WE Immigration and Customs Enforcement Police officers have been ordered not to engage in high-speed car chases and to only stop their vehicles if they have undergone specific training, according to new internal guidelines released after several drivers were shot and killed during encounters with ICE.
A memo sent to agents with ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations division and obtained by The Associated Press warns that they are not authorized under any circumstances to pursue vehicles that fail to stop. Instead, agents should note vehicle information for further investigation, according to the memo signed by ICE Associate Executive Director Marcos D. Charles and dated Wednesday.
The new guidelines come after the ICE initiative the vehicle stops The violence escalated on several occasions when drivers refused to cooperate or tried to flee. ICE agents have fired their weapons in more than a dozen such encounters since last year, killing at least four people and injuring several others.
President Donald Trump’s administration is facing internal tensions over how to handle traffic stops, which are considered particularly high-risk situations.
AP AUDIO: New ICE guidelines ban high-speed car chases, establish stricter rules for traffic stops, memo says
New ICE guidelines ban high-speed car chases and establish stricter rules for traffic stops. AP’s Lisa Dwyer reports.
After fatal shootings of drivers in Maine and Texas in July, ICE agents were requested to temporarily suspend most vehicles stop. But the next day, Trump took to social media to run the agency to continue traffic stops, calling them “one of ICE’s most important and effective crime-fighting tools.”
ICE has faced intense pressure from the White House to expel more people in the country illegally, and its arrests have reached record numbers. At the same time, the agency’s rapid hiring spree last year led some poorly screened and poorly trained agents to take to the streets.
In a statement, ICE downplayed the memo, which said the new guidance was intended to replace and amend previous guidance issued earlier this year, last year and in 2018.
“From time to time, ICE leadership sends guidance reminders to law enforcement officers,” the statement said. “Vehicle checks and arrests of illegal aliens continue. »
The new memo outlines measures intended to improve the safety of vehicle stops for ICE agents, the drivers they target, their passengers, and the public.
The memo instructs ICE field office directors to ensure that vehicles used for traffic stops are equipped with lights and sirens that let the public know they are law enforcement vehicles when activated. All officers present at the scene of vehicle inspections must wear and activate their body cameras, under direction.
Additionally, only officers who have completed one of the agency’s five specific training courses can conduct vehicle checks. Officers who have not completed the training courses can only participate in vehicle checks “in a supportive capacity” as passengers and cannot be drivers of any of the vehicles involved.
The guidance says ICE agents can continue to use a controversial technique known as pinning, which is defined as “using a vehicle or physical barrier to trap or stop a car,” but only if they have received special training. Likewise, only trained officers can use tire-deflating spike strips to prevent drivers from fleeing.
The memo arrived the day Courtroom testimony brought to light how two ICE agents involved in a one-vehicle stop, chase and shooting that injured a delivery driver in Austin last month allegedly failed to follow new guidelines.
At a bond hearing for Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, testimony showed the officer who shot him was not wearing a body-worn camera. The ICE officer who had a camera was driving in a separate car and turned it off during the chase.
Prosecutors presented surveillance video showing an ICE agent chasing Garces Perez at high speed through residential streets after fleeing an initial traffic stop.
Garces Perez faces federal assault charges after investigators say he hit an ICE agent with his driver’s side mirror. That officer then fired at Perez’s vehicle, shooting him in the back, authorities said.
Garces Perez’s lawyers called the charges against him “retaliation” and argued that the camera footage was inconclusive because it did not fully capture the moment he allegedly tried to flee.
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Associated Press reporter Anna Wilder contributed to this report from Austin, Texas.
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