WASHINGTON – An immigrants rights group complained Wednesday that U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents in 2007 arrested a group of 24 Hispanics in the parking lot of a 7-Eleven in Baltimore because they had to meet arrest quotas.

CASA de Maryland presented an internal Department of Homeland Security report written after the raids that shows that there were contradictions among the sworn statements given by the agents.

“First they said that they went to buy something because they were hungry and the immigrants came up to them and said they were looking for work,” whereupon the agents arrested them, Mario Quiroz, a CASA de Maryland spokesman, told Efe.

But in the store's videotape records, to which the organization also had access, it can be seen that the agents arrested some immigrants with whom they had never exchanged any words.

“They arrested some who were inside and others who were waiting for the bus on the street to the side,” said Quiroz, who expressed regret over the fact that on the tape it can also be seen how the agents only arrested people who had Latino features.

The agents were part of a special ICE group created after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, to detain terrorist suspects and dangerous criminals with outstanding deportation orders.

Of the 24 people detained that morning, 14 were indeed undocumented immigrants, but “only two or three” – according to CASA – were fugitives.

Among the ones without a criminal record or deportation order was Ernesto Guillen, who had stopped to get a cup of coffee before going to the hospital where his wife and 4-year-old son, who was sick with leukemia, were waiting for him.

According to CASA de Maryland, the agents had just finished their shift and because they had not fulfilled their detention quotas for the previous night, they went to a place frequented by Hispanic workers.

“Desperation to reach a monthly quota” motivated the ICE agents to conduct these arrests “with the only criterion being that (the people they arrested) resembled Hispanics,” said the organization.

Quiroz said that this was not the first time that an incident of this kind had occurred, “but never before has it been documented so well.”

CASA de Maryland has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government in the names of three of the arrested people in which it is requesting an indemnity of $500,000 for each.

Two of them are still in the United States and Salvadoran Jose del Transito submitted to voluntary deportation at the end of 2007.

“We want the truth about what happened and an apology. The worst thing is that after the raid they lied to us for two years,” one of the five lawyers handling the case, Justin Cox, told Efe.

The activists have requested a meeting with the secretary of homeland security, Janet Napolitano, to discuss ICE's operating policies.

“It may be that not everyone agrees with us about ending the raids, but everyone does agree that the government can't lie any more,” Cox said.

The attorney rejected the arrest quota policy because of “the pressure it puts on agents, which can lead them to make arrests without probable cause.”

CASA de Maryland executive director Gustavo Torres said that “these are the agents who swore an oath to protect and serve the constitution.” EFE