politics

Checkpoints, Immigration and Las Azaleas

by Sito Negron

Las Azaleas, where Rodriguez does his business, is one of the Lower Valley neighborhoods in which the El Paso County Sheriff’s Department has set up sporadic roadblocks to check for drivers’ licenses, registration, proof of insurance, and, some charge, U.S. residency documents.

Posted on November 13, 2006

Photographs by Vanessa Monsisvais

Jose Rodriguez owns Pepe’s General Store, which is plastered inside with beer signs, photos of historic El Paso, Pancho Villa, and sports, and a poster of Ché Guevara. Maybe half a mile from the store, which serves colonia Las Azaleas, is the border, where a metal watchtower on a hydraulic arm stands guard, along with, on one recent day, a very young National Guardsman in a silver truck with Arizona plates.

Colonia Las Azaleas, in San Elizario, only a few blocks from that town’s historic center, almost reminds one of Mesilla, a picturesque setting of trees and adobe. Almost, because unlike the New Mexico tourist attraction of Mesilla, San Elizario is largely low-income, spotted with graffiti, and set right on the border.

“Pampas, Sparks, Rio Vista,” Rodriguez said, naming low-income neighborhoods in the Lower Valley and the eastern part of El Paso County. “They (sheriff’s deputies) are targeting small communities.”

Rodriguez went public with his complaints last week, reading a statement at the El Paso County Commissioners’ Court meeting. The statement was rebutted by Sheriff Leo Samaniego at the meeting. Sheriff’s spokesman Rick Glancey, who said the sheriff was done answering questions about the issue, said in a later interview that the department simply is trying to enforce traffic laws, and does not enforce immigration laws.

“The bottom line is we enforce traffic laws everywhere across the county,” Glancey said. “It has nothing to do with immigration.”

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Rodriguez’s statement followed a series of large events over the spring and summer, in which the allegations of the sheriff’s enforcement of immigration laws became national news, and small events at his store the week before, when deputies followed a young man into Rodriguez’s store on Oct. 27 and gave him a ticket for not having a license.

There are two ways to get from the street into the store’s corner parking lot. One is over a low, sloped curb along Lisa Guerra, the main street, and the other is into the driveway on the intersecting side street.

The young man had made what deputies considered an abrupt left turn into the store from Lisa Guerra when he saw a checkpoint ahead; Rodriguez said the driver was simply turning into the store’s driveway, and made a long turn to avoid having the low-riding car jump the short curb. After the deputies followed the driver, his only customer that day, into the store, Rodriguez said, he had enough.

He put up a sign warning of the checkpoint ahead. The sign was placed on a “construction ahead” sign on his property. Rodriguez was ticketed for placing a post on state property. He said it was retaliation for his warning of the checkpoint, noting that the construction sign was on his property, is not owned by the state, and the sign is a leftover -- there is no current construction.

Glancey said the state law is the state law. “We’re not in charge of construction,” he said. Glancey also said that Rodriguez had been given a verbal warning for speeding a week before the incident.

He repeated an allegation made by the sheriff earlier in the summer, when the issue of checkpoints became news because of residents’ complaints. Glancey said state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh stirred up the allegations because of Samaniego’s endorsement of Dee Margo, who lost to Shapleigh Nov. 7. Shapleigh has called the allegations, which surfaced first in spring and heated up again in summer, an attempt to deflect the issue. [background]

On the ground, the situation settled down after a flurry of activity in July and August, Rodriguez said. “The advocates came and it calmed down, but it (checkpoints) started again in October,” he said.

Meanwhile, residents in Las Azaleas appear somewhat stuck between the border and a hard place. San Elizario, like much of El Paso, has its own tradition of smuggling and the criminal web that results. People know each other, and what they do, and often law enforcement does as well. In fact, officers and criminals often come from the same neighborhoods, grew up together, and know each other personally.

“There is crime in all communities in El Paso, and there are people who drive without license or insurance or registration and it’s our job to make sure when you get hit on the road you don’t get by people without (legal driving documents),” Glancey said. “We also get calls from people about suspicious subjects, which leads to narcotics trafficking. We have a responsibility to respond.”

* * *

Several customers at Pepe’s would not speak about the situation, citing a fear of retaliation, whether from law enforcement or criminals.

One customer who would speak, Pilar Rosales, said she was questioned and asked for papers while walking to cash a check. She said she refused -- she knows her rights, she said, because of community meetings in which residents are told their rights by organizing entities such as the El Paso Interreligious Sponsoring Organization or the Border Network for Human Rights.

County Attorney Jose Rodriguez, no relation to the store owner, has been watching the issue.

“I’m very confident this was not a politically motivated issue. These issues started to come up ... well before the campaign became an issue,” Rodriguez said.

He said that the sheriff has responded to the issue somewhat. “He’s always maintained that he does not engage in immigration enforcement and he has instructions to his deputies that they not do so. The latest revised policy, when he restarted the checkpoints, has some language in there ... not to enforce immigration law.”

Rodriguez said he was concerned about liability, and about people’s potential unwillingness to call officers to report crimes.

“My principal concern toward him (the sheriff) and the county as legal advisor is to avoid liability because someone feels their rights were violated,” Rodriguez said. “We’re here to protect people, not to make them feel vulnerable to law enforcement. I am afraid of people not wanting to report crimes, specifically family violence. We’ve been working very hard on that over the years.”

That is an issue that resonates within the city, where Police Chief Richard Wiles expressed the same concern at a recent City Council meeting, and nationally, with the Major Cities Chiefs Association taking the same stand. A New York Times article Nov. 12 about “sanctuary cities,” which have policies discouraging or forbidding asking people about their immigration status when they report crimes, outlines some of the issues involving immigration and local law enforcement.

“Critics argue that sanctuary policies discourage the police from enforcing laws, though about 50 cities and counties have enacted variations on sanctuary, according to the National Immigration Law Center. They include Detroit, Los Angeles, New York and Washington. A handful of states have similar policies, including Alaska, Maine and Oregon,” states the article. “... An organization of police chiefs, the Major Cities Chiefs Association, said that requiring the local police to enforce immigration policy did not “take into full account the realities of local law enforcement dealing with this issue on the ground.” The association said its concerns included a lack of authority, training, and resources, as well as risks of liability.” [link]

Meanwhile, at Pepe’s, with its rows of Mexican staples and typical American supermarket fare -- tortillas, rice, beans, potatoes, chile, and white bread -- customers continue to roll in and out, and store owner Rodriguez keeps an eye out for new checkpoints. Just down the road, he said, Minutemen, the volunteer freelance -- some call them vigilante -- border patrollers, continue to keep a lookout, although officially their mission ended in October.