Six people living in Hawaii were among 2,900 illegal immigrants with criminal records arrested over seven days recently in the largest nationwide crackdown of its kind, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Michael Samaniego, assistant director of the ICE field office in Hawaii, said the four men and two women were arrested Sept. 17-21 and are being held in the federal detention center near Honolulu Airport.
One person was from South Korea, four from the Philippines and one is from Tonga, Samaniego said.
Their felony convictions include domestic violence, larceny, bribery, drugs, assault, fraudulent and illegal use of credit cards and theft.
"Some of them are multiple offenders," he added.
However, unlike the mainland arrests, which included a 54-year-old Dominican Republic native who was convicted of second-degree murder, the most violent illegal immigrant criminal arrested here has a conviction for assault, Samaniego said.
The six will be held pending immigration and deportation hearings.
ICE agents fanned out throughout the state and the mainland looking for illegal immigrants and fugitives convicted or charged with serious crimes.
"The results of this targeted enforcement operation underscore ICE’s ongoing commitment and focus on the arrest and removal of convicted criminal aliens and those that game our nation’s immigration system," ICE Director John Morton said.
All of those taken into custody have criminal convictions in the United States, and at least 1,282 had multiple criminal convictions, Morton said in a statement.
More than 1,600 of those arrested had felony convictions, including attempted murder, manslaughter and kidnapping, he added.
About 1 million illegal immigrants in the U.S. have been convicted of crimes, the agency estimates. Of the 390,000 people ICE removes from the country annually, more than half have criminal records.
The operation was the second nationwide sweep in operation "Cross Check." In June, more than 2,400 illegal immigrants who had previously been convicted of crimes were arrested, immigration officials said.
