by Kate Sheehy
It was still dark when a Red Bluff woman peered through her apartment window this morning to discover two men dressed in dark uniforms with badges that read “police.” She opened the door only after they showed her the driver’s license of a family member who had left for work less than 10 minutes earlier.
The officers were actually from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), in town, according to the Tehama County Sheriff’s Department, for a two-day operation. Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston told ChicoSol that his office was notified March 18 that the ICE Mobile Criminal Alien Team had “targeted 41 criminal alien individuals” in the area. He did not provide specifics on the types of crimes involved, but said ICE had outlined three tiers of “fugitives.”