Breaking: Immigrant To Be Deported After Father's Day Weekend Bust
If undocumented immigrant Julio Alvarez had any idea waiting for his children on the Bouncy Castle ride at the Strawberry Days Festival in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, was going to end with his deportation, he never would have spent Father’s Day weekend, 2011 with his children. Garfield County Sheriff’s Deputies approached Julio and his brother Cesar, and asked them to follow the deputies to a mobile command station, leaving the Alvarez children unsupervised. The Sheriff’s Office suggests they were not at fault for leaving the kids alone because the Alvarez brothers “consented” to go with them.
When Julio’s wife, Lorenza, who was seven months pregnant, could not find either her children, or the brothers, she panicked and called carnival security, who likely knew exactly where Julio and Cesar were: Under arrest, having been handed over to ICE. The Sheriff's Office takes credit for calling the ambulance when Lorenza became distraught and had to be transported to the hospital.
News travels fast in the Latino community about ICE raids. News travels fast amongst English speakers in the small town of Glenwood Springs, famous for it’s hot springs, that the cops had chased a man through the carnival earlier in the day, presumably when he did not "consent" to their request to have a little chat. Neither immigrants, Latinos nor English speaking families wanted anything to to with law enforcement’s version of playing rough house in an amusement park, and the carnival went nearly vacant on Sunday. That is the day when merchants depend upon recouping their investment in the festival.
Small town sheriff’s departments rely on citizens to cooperate with law enforcement to do their job. As it turns out, the Garfield County Sheriff got the bright idea of inviting ICE to their carnival, a move which alienated everyone. Who wants to take their tiny tots and pregnant wives to places where aggressive police actions are in process?
Sheriff Lou Vallario
According the the Sheriff’s Office, ICE got involved as part of a “Multi-Jurisdictional Gang Enforcement Operation” which took ICE away from protecting our borders and netted the huge sum of three individuals including Julio, who claims he is a father and not a member of a gang. His only crme was wearing a sports shirt and being Latino.
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