Reports of violence tied to alleged immigrant smugglers

Andrew Glazer

WEST SIDE -- The landlord of an apartment where immigration officials say

illegal immigrant smugglers held dozens of their clients until they were

paid, said he had been concerned about the number of people who were

apparently living there.

“Neighbors always complained about the noise,” said Yun Yu, who also owns

and works at Sunshine Liquors at 724 W. 19th St., which is next door to

the apartment. “Sometimes there were so many people.”

Yu said he frequently saw his tenant, Catalina Ramirez-Reyes, and others,

leading vanloads of people into the apartment.

Agents from the Immigration and Naturalization Service’s Anti-Smuggling

Unit on Monday stormed the apartment at 724 1/2 W. 19th St., arresting

six suspects who had allegedly picked up Mexican citizens near the

U.S.-Mexico border, hid them from authorities and shuttled them to Costa

Mesa.

The apartment appeared to be deserted Thursday. A pile of broken glass

lay in front of the home where INS agents had broken though a window.

Empty suitcases, stacks of tires, 15 folding chairs, two mattresses and a

pile of full trash bags were strewn across the frontyard. In the rear of

the home, four red chickens in a coop pecked at the ground.

Paty Madueno, a member of the Costa Mesa City Council’s Latino Community

Advisors, said immigrant smugglers take advantage of poor, desperate

people looking for a better life.

Madueno has held meetings at St. Joachim Catholic Church with immigrants

who paid smugglers, or “coyotes,” to get them across the border. She said

many told stories of the smugglers raping, extorting and even murdering

the hopeful immigrants.

“They’re really bad guys,” Madueno said. “The money they make is blood

money. They don’t have shame. They will burn in hell.”

The alleged smugglers charged the illegal immigrants $1,200 for their

services, William M. Crawford, a special agent for the INS, said in sworn

court documents.

“That’s about the going rate,” said Robert J. Harvey, a supervisor of

Santa Ana’s INS Special Agent Anti-Smuggling Unit.

Josephina Cruz-Ibarra, Catalina Ramirez-Reyes, Idolina Ramirez-Reyes,

Miguel Plancorte-Sanchez, Rito Arzante-Picasso and Armando Roman-Flores

are being held in criminal custody in the Metropolitan Detention Center

in Los Angeles, Harvey said.Preliminary hearings are scheduled for Feb. 8

at the U.S. District Court in Santa Ana. They are scheduled to be

arraigned there on Feb. 14.

Harvey said INS agents were investigating whether the home was part of a

larger network of immigrant smugglers.

INS agents began staking out the home late last month, Harvey said.

According to Crawford’s testimony, they witnessed the suspects leading

people from vans and a Chevrolet Suburban into the home. He said they

appeared to be recently smuggled immigrants.

On one occasion, Crawford said he witnessed one man run from the van,

apparently trying to escape from the smugglers without paying the $1,200

fee.

The driver of one van yanked him into the house by his shirt and hair,

the reports said.

“They often try to show others that it would be stupid to step outside

line,” Harvey said. “In this instance, it looks like they tried to get

the point across to the others in the house. Smugglers may use threats of

violence or actual violence to keep people in line.”

Harvey said most successful immigrant smuggling operations have wide

connections throughout the country, even though they may appear to be

small in a particular area.