Clearing up confusion on ICE raids in the Capital Region

CAPITAL REGION, N.Y. (NEWS10) -- NEWS 10 has received numerous tips over the past few weeks claiming ICE raids were happening throughout the Capital Region.  Our crews have worked diligently through each tip to find none of these raids have happened. NEWS10 spoke with local law enforcement to learn more about the process of how they operate with ICE.

The Rensselaer County Jail is New York’s only jail that has an agreement with ICE. “Everybody that comes through our jail gets run through a federal database to determine whether they’re wanted by ICE for crimes committed in the United States or another country,” explained Rensselaer County Sheriff Kyle Bourgault.

The sheriff said they have partnered with ICE since 2018 in an effort to make things more efficient. He explained that before they joined up with ICE, “We would have to notify them and wait for a return phone call or wait for a return e-mail. Where they [suspect] might be able to be released waiting for them, and now we’re waiting for them to respond to us. At that point, we wouldn’t be able to hold them anymore. So, it just gives us an expedited response."

So, NEWS10 asked him, “How many of these warrants have actually been processed since January?”

To which the sheriff answered, “None.” He went on to explain, “The Rensselaer County Sheriff’s Office has no obligation, and we have no intention of going out and doing compliance checks for who’s here illegally in the country. It’s not what we do. It’s not what we’ve ever done."

But what they do normally is they book suspected criminals into the jail and process them for any possible links to warrants anywhere else. "We notify them, we let them know we have this person in our custody, a potential release date so they’re aware of and they can make arrangements for when they’re to be released," said Bourgault.

The sheriff explains that his deputies go to training in North Carolina every three years. “They are trained to utilize the database that the federal government provides us. So we can identify people wanted by ICE. If there’s a high-risk warrant. That ICE comes into our county. Looking for our cooperation and our resources. We’re going to provide them with those resources 100% to get somebody with a criminal, legal warrant out of our county.”

He explains that it's simply a public safety concern, "So the next time something happens I don’t have to go and knock on somebody’s door and say 'I’m so sorry. But I have to tell you this, your daughter was murdered, your son was murdered by an illegal alien. Your son overdosed because of fentanyl.’  That is my number one priority that I never have to do that again.”