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ALIEN REMOVALS UNDER OPERATION PREDATOR

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION, 

BORDER SECURITY, AND CLAIMS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

March 4, 2004

Serial No. 73

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/judiciary 

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., Wisconsin, Chairman 

HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

WILLIAM L. JENKINS, Tennessee 

CHRIS CANNON, Utah 

SPENCER BACHUS, Alabama 

JOHN N. HOSTETTLER, Indiana 

MARK GREEN, Wisconsin 

RIC KELLER, Florida 

MELISSA A. HART, Pennsylvania 

JEFF FLAKE, Arizona 

MIKE PENCE, Indiana 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

JOHN R. CARTER, Texas 

TOM FEENEY, Florida 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

JOHN CONYERS, JR., Michigan 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

RICK BOUCHER, Virginia 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

ROBERT C. SCOTT, Virginia 

MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

MARTIN T. MEEHAN, Massachusetts 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

ROBERT WEXLER, Florida 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York 

ADAM B. SCHIFF, California 

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California

PHILIP G. KIKO, Chief of Staff-General Counsel 

PERRY H. APELBAUM, Minority Chief Counsel 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION, BORDER SECURITY, AND CLAIMS

JOHN N. HOSTETTLER, Indiana, Chairman

JEFF FLAKE, Arizona 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

CHRIS CANNON, Utah 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

MELISSA A. HART, Pennsylvania 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

JOHN CONYERS, JR., Michigan

GEORGE FISHMAN, Chief Counsel 

ART ARTHUR, Full Committee Counsel 

LUKE BELLOCCHI, Counsel 

CINDY BLACKSTON, Professional Staff 

NOLAN RAPPAPORT, Minority Counsel 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

MARCH 4, 2004

OPENING STATEMENT 

Page 

The Honorable John N. Hostettler, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Indiana, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Immigration, Border 

Security, and Claims ............................................................................................ 1

The Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Texas, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Claims ..................................................................................... 11

WITNESSES 

The Honorable Michael J. Garcia, Assistant Secretary, U.S. Immigration and 

Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 3

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 6

Mr. John Walsh, Chairman of the National Advisory Board of the National 

Center for Missing and Exploited Children; host of ‘‘America’s Most Wanted: America Fights Back’’

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 14

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 19

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Prepared Statement of the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a Representative 

in Congress From the State of Texas, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee 

on Immigration, Border Security, and Claims ................................................... 13

(1)

ALIEN REMOVALS UNDER

OPERATION PREDATOR 

THURSDAY, MARCH 4, 2004

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION,

BORDER SECURITY, AND CLAIMS, 

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, 

Washington, DC.

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:12 a.m., in 

Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. John N. 

Hostettler [Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. The Subcommittee will come to order. Today 

the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Claims 

will examine ‘‘Operation Predator,’’ the new U.S. Immigration and 

Customs Enforcement’s effort to identify and remove alien child 

sexual predators. I congratulate Assistant Secretary Michael Garcia for instituting Operation Predator and making the removal of 

aliens who perpetrate these heinous crimes a priority of his agency. 

According to a recent study funded in part by the Department of 

Justice, between 300,000 and 400,000 U.S. children are victims of 

some type of sexual exploitation every year. The National Center 

for Missing and Exploited Children has reported an increase of reported child abuse cases from 4,500 in 1998 to 82,000 in 2003. 

Major news stories continually break about sexual predators who 

are guests, invited or uninvited, in our country. In December, a 

British national employed as a diving coach at North Carolina 

State University was arrested and pleaded guilty to sex crimes. 

Rafael Ruiz, a Dominican national, was sentenced by a Federal 

judge in September to 44 months in prison for operating a brothel 

in Plainsfield, New Jersey, and for his part in smuggling Mexican 

children into the U.S. to work as forced prostitutes. 

In Baltimore, ICE agents arrested 50 convicted alien child sex 

predators in August. Fifty. All had avoided deportation. One of 

them was a summer camp employee who was convicted of molesting three pre-pubescent sisters. 

In my home state of Indiana alone, ICE has arrested 26 child 

sexual predators. This includes the arrest of Mexican nationals 

Jose Delana Martinez, who was previously convicted of the sexual 

battery of a 13-year-old in Johnson County; and Adrian Herrera, 

convicted of sexual misconduct with his own 14-year-old daughter. 

The children who are the victims of these criminals can be immigrants themselves, preyed upon in their own neighborhoods; or 

they can be native born. In either case, it should be the DepartVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:14 May 21, 2004 Jkt 089266 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 G:\WORK\IMMIG\030404\92347.000 HJUD1 PsN: 92347
2

ment of Homeland Security’s goal to protect all of America’s children. 

In the past, the Judiciary Committee has worked to enact bills 

that assist in combatting child sexual predators, including Megan’s 

Law, the Missing Children Act, the PROTECT Act, and even the 

Homeland Security Act. These pieces of legislation have all made 

Operator Predator possible. 

Operation Predator is an initiative Mr. Garcia launched on July 

9, 2003, to identify alien child predators and remove them from the 

United States. As part of this operation, ICE is working with State 

and local police to help arrest alien predators and apprehend smugglers of children. ICE is prioritizing for removal aliens already convicted of sex offenses, as well as identifying alien sex offenders in 

prisons around the country so that they can be removed upon release. 

The bureau routinely notifies foreign governments of aliens with 

a history of sex offenses before their removal, and seeks information from foreign governments about sex offenders seeking entry 

into the United States. In less than 8 months, ICE has arrested 

over 2,000 child predators and sex offenders as part of Operation 

Predator. This project clearly demonstrates the effectiveness of the 

merger of various immigration and law enforcement components 

into the Department of Homeland Security. It also demonstrates 

the need to draw on cooperation from State, local, and non-governmental resources to combat the national tragedy of child sexual exploitation and abuse. 

For example, the combination of the Customs Service’s history of 

combatting pornography and former INS’ role in removing aliens is 

utilized to hunt down alien child predators in this program. Now 

merged into the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ‘‘ICE,’’ the intelligence capabilities and experience of its former components are utilized more effectively than previously possible. 

ICE has created the Cyber Smuggling Center as the national 

base to hunt down illegal pornographers and alien child predators 

who use the Internet to lure minors. It has cross referenced their 

former databases to find alien absconders with child predator histories. 

ICE has recently created a website, the National Child Victim 

Identification System, that combines State Megan’s Law registries 

of sexual predators to create, in effect, an easily accessible national 

database of child sexual offenders. 

ICE has recently signed a memorandum of understanding with 

the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, or 

NCMEC, an organization made possible by the Missing Children 

Assistance Act. This allows NCMEC to provide ICE with information from their own reports with alien child predators, and creates 

the National Child Victim Identification System. 

The Subcommittee will examine these components of Operation 

Predator in more detail to see how ICE has taken the lead in protecting our children from harm. We will also examine how this 

Subcommittee may further empower ICE in ridding the country of 

alien predators of child sex crimes. 

The Chair now turns to the gentleman from Arizona for an opening statement if he has one. 

3

Mr. FLAKE. Thank the gentleman. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. President George W. Bush appointed Mr. Michael Garcia to serve as the Assistant Secretary for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, November 25, 2003, as part 

of the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. ICE focuses on an array of national security, financial, and smuggling 

violations, including human trafficking, commercial fraud, narcotics 

smuggling, child pornography and exploitation, and immigration 

fraud. 

Just prior to this appointment, Mr. Garcia was Acting Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. He also 

served as a career Federal prosecutor in New York City, working 

on high-profile terrorism cases such as the bombing of U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam and the first attempted World 

Trade Center bombing in 1993. 

Mr. Garcia is a graduate of the State University of New York at 

Binghamton. He received his master’s degree from the College of 

William and Mary, in English; and his juris doctorate from the Albany Law School of Union University, where he was valedictorian. 

During the transition to the Department of Homeland Security, 

Mr. Garcia integrated several law enforcement organizations to 

form ICE. Among them was the Customs Service, with a history of 

combatting pornography and exploitation of minors, and the enforcement wing of the former INS. A product of this unique combination has been his brainchild: Operation Predator. 

Mr. Garcia, I invite you to tell the Subcommittee about your 

project’s many accomplishments today. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE MICHAEL J. GARCIA, ASSISTANT SECRETARY, U.S. IMMIGRATION AND CUSTOMS ENFORCEMENT, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY 

Mr. GARCIA. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Members of 

the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before 

you today to discuss Operation Predator, one of the priority initiatives of the Department of Homeland Security’s U.S. Immigration 

and Customs Enforcement, or ICE. 

In July of last year, Secretary Ridge joined forces with John 

Walsh of ‘‘America’s Most Wanted’’ and Ernie Allen, president of 

the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, or 

NCMEC, to launch Operation Predator, a program to target some 

of the most heinous criminals on our streets: those who sexually 

abuse children. 

Each year, as you mentioned Mr. Chairman, millions of children 

fall prey to sexual predators. Experts estimate that one in five girls 

and one in ten boys in the United States are sexually exploited before they reach adulthood. These young victims are left with permanent physical and emotional scars. That tragedy is compounded 

by the fact that child prostitution, human trafficking, child pornography, and international sex tourism now generate billions of dollars a year worldwide. The advent of the Internet, with its borderless and anonymous cyberspace, has created even greater opportunities for predators to profit by exploiting children. Operation Predator was established to combat these activities. 

4

Operation Predator is a coordinated law enforcement and public 

awareness program that draws upon ICE’s unique investigative authorities and resources, as well as ICE’s evolving relationships with 

organizations like NCMEC. The program has two primary goals: 

First, to identify, investigate, arrest and, where appropriate, deport these predators; and 

Second, in partnership with NCMEC, to educate parents about 

the threats their children face, and what they can do to protect 

their families. 

I am pleased to report that Operation Predator has resulted in 

an unprecedented success. In the 8 months since the program was 

first launched, more than 2,000 child sex predators and sex offenders have been taken off the streets of America. We have initiated 

the largest ever investigation into child pornography, and we have 

effected the first ever arrests of sex tourists under the new statutory authority provided by the recently enacted PROTECT Act. 

We want to send a message loud and clear that international 

borders no longer shield child sex predators from the law. While 

Operation Predator is indeed a worldwide enforcement effort, it has 

a direct impact on the safety of the streets in your local communities, as evidenced in that nearly 1,300 of the predator arrests occurred in the nine States represented by the Members of this Subcommittee. 

While illegal aliens, lawful permanent residents, and U.S. citizens are all potential targets of Operation Predator, the vast majority of the more than 2,000 arrests to date are illegal aliens or otherwise legal residents whose crimes make them subject to removal 

from this country. 

Two thousand predators. Who are they? They include a pediatrician in Chicago who had child pornography in his home and date 

rape drugs hidden in his car; an illegal alien in Texas convicted of 

the sexual assault of a child, after having been deported from the 

United States on three previous occasions—he is now detailed and 

serving time in a Federal prison, awaiting deportation; and an 

American citizen from Seattle who thought he could avoid justice 

by flying to Cambodia to engage in sex with 7-year-old boys. These 

are just a few of the faces of Operation Predator. How they came 

into the custody of ICE is the subject of today’s hearing. 

As you know, a year ago this week, ICE was formed by combining the investigative and intelligence arms of the former Immigration and Naturalization Service and the U.S. Customs Service, 

as well as the Federal Protective Service and the Federal Air Marshals. By integrating these once fragmented resources, the Department of Homeland Security not only created the second-largest investigative agency in the Federal Government, but it also created 

a dynamic and innovative new law enforcement organization focused on homeland security—specifically, border security, air security, and economic security. 

One of the issues ICE faced was a large alien absconder population, fugitives with outstanding final orders of removal. Applying 

a systematic approach to addressing the large number of alien absconders, ICE set about prioritizing the most dangerous offenders. 

We first developed a ‘‘Top Ten’’ list, with the worst of the worst. 

While this standard law enforcement tool was not regularly emVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:14 May 21, 2004 Jkt 089266 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 G:\WORK\IMMIG\030404\92347.000 HJUD1 PsN: 92347
5

ployed by the legacy INS, it proved to be a tremendous success for 

ICE. With the help of John Walsh and ‘‘America’s Most Wanted,’’ nine of the original ‘‘Top Ten’’ were located and apprehended within the first 2 weeks, and the tenth was soon confirmed to have already left the country. 

This initiative revealed that among the most violent criminal 

subset of the alien absconder population, many have convictions for 

sexual offenses and, in particular, offenses against children. By 

law, any non-citizen who commits such a crime is to be deported 

back to his or her home country. Unfortunately, that wasn’t always 

the case under the INS, as you well know. The Committee has 

heard too many times terrible stories about predators who should 

have been detained and deported, but were instead freed to prey 

upon our children again. 

To address this problem, ICE began to examine Megan’s Law directories, matching our immigration databases to those Megan’s 

Law lists and taking into custody deportable aliens convicted of 

sexual crimes against children. Our success rate was astounding, 

Mr. Chairman, and we quickly came to recognize the awful dimension of the child predator problem. 

In addition to the high number of alien predators, our investigators were unearthing remarkable numbers of child pornographers 

on the Internet, human smuggling organizations trafficking in children for sexual exploitation; as well as sex tourists, American citizens who travel to other countries to engage in sex with minors. 

ICE has made the first four arrests under that new statute. 

In a way unforeseeable before the creation of the Department of 

Homeland Security, ICE is coordinating our powerful resources and 

authorities into a united campaign against those who prey upon 

our children; drawing upon the full range of intelligence, investigative, and detention and removal functions of ICE to target those 

who exploit children. Protecting children from these ruthless predators is undoubtedly paramount to our homeland security mission. 

Operation Predator is truly an ICE team effort that employs almost every one of ICE’s six operational divisions. ICE special 

agents are on the front lines of our investigative efforts, but other 

ICE components are critical to the success of this initiative. 

For example, the ICE Law Enforcement Support Center, or the 

LESC, serves as a national enforcement operations and intelligence 

center by providing timely information on the status and identities 

of alien suspects arrested or convicted of criminal activity. The 

LESC has lodged over 180 administrative detainers on aliens who 

have been arrested for Operation Predator offenses. Further, leads 

are sent to the ICE field offices for action, and the LESC coordinates with local law enforcement when the call requires local intervention. 

A prime example of the LESC’s impact was demonstrated in the 

arrest of a particularly heinous child predator late last summer. In 

August 2003, the LESC received a call on the Predator Hotline. 

The call indicated that a 27-year-old Kenyan national, who was reportedly afflicted with AIDS, was having sex with female minors 

in the Boston area. The ICE LESC immediately provided the information to police in Lawrence, Massachusetts, who then arrested 

the individual the following day on charges of raping a 14-year-old 

6

1 Carol Bellamy, UNICEF Executive Director, ‘‘Child exploitation is one of UNICEF’s top five 

concerns for children in 2004’’, January 1, 2004. 2D. Finkelhor. ‘‘Current Information on the Scope and Nature of Child Sexual Abuse.’’ The 

Future of Children: Sexual Abuse of Children, 1994. 

girl in a local apartment. An ICE detainer was also placed on the 

individual, because he will come into our custody when the criminal proceedings are concluded. 

The case represents just a single example of how the public is 

one of our most valuable partners. Members of the public are encouraged to call our 800—866–DHS–2ICE line to report sex offenders to ICE. We have also created a dedicated e-mail address at 

‘‘Operation.Predator at dhs.gov’’ to receive tips through e-mail. 

As I mentioned before, we have an excellent working relationship 

with NCMEC. We have two agents assigned to review the hundreds of leads generated daily from NCMEC’s Hotline and 

CyberTipline. From these tips, our agents are able to generate a 

significant number of leads that are sent out to the ICE field offices 

around the country. 

Just last month, the ICE office in Los Angeles conducted a 

search based on a NCMEC lead. During the search, a computer 

and narcotics paraphernalia were seized. And based upon what was 

found, Los Angeles Child Protective Services removed three children from that home. 

On March 1st, 2004, we celebrated the 1-year anniversary of the 

Department of Homeland Security and ICE. Clearly, we have seen 

that the merging of the legacy missions and authorities in ICE allows a multi-disciplined approach to homeland security that is crucial to our efforts to safeguard America, especially our children. 

Through Operation Predator, ICE is working diligently to implement the President’s goal of eradicating the special evil in the 

abuse and exploitation of the most innocent and vulnerable. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee, for 

the opportunity to testify today on this important topic. And I am 

eager to continue to work with Congress and to provide the American people with the level of security they demand and deserve. 

And I look forward to your questions. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Garcia follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MICHAEL J. GARCIA

MR. CHAIRMAN AND MEMBERS OF THE SUBCOMMITTEE, thank you for the 

opportunity to appear before you today to discuss Operation Predator, one of the priority initiatives of the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) U.S. Immigration 

and Customs Enforcement (ICE). 

In July of last year, Secretary Ridge joined forces with John Walsh (‘‘America’s 

Most Wanted’’) and Ernie Allen, of the National Center for Missing and Exploited 

Children (NCMEC), to launch Operation Predator, a program to target some of the 

most heinous criminals on our streets—those who sexually abuse children. 

Each year, millions of children fall prey to sexual predators.1 Experts estimate 

that one-in-five girls and one-in-ten boys in the United States are sexually exploited 

before they reach adulthood.2 These young victims are left with permanent psychological, physical, and emotional scars. That tragedy is compounded by the fact that 

child prostitution, human trafficking, child pornography, and international sex tourism now generate billions of dollars a year worldwide. The advent of the Internet, 

with its borderless and anonymous cyberspace, has created even greater opportunities for predators to profit by exploiting children. Operation Predator was established to combat these activities. 

Operation Predator is a coordinated law enforcement and public awareness program that draws upon ICE’s unique investigative authorities and resources, as well 

7

as ICE’s evolving relationships with organizations like NCMEC. The program has 

two primary goals:

(1) To identify, investigate, arrest and, when appropriate, deport these predators; and

(2) To educate parents about the threats their children face and what they can 

do to protect their families.

I am pleased to report that Operation Predator has resulted in unprecedented successes. In the eight months since the program was first launched, more than 2,000 

child predators and sex offenders have been taken off the streets of America; we 

have initiated the largest-ever investigation into online child pornography; and we 

have affected the first-ever arrests of sex tourists under the new statutory authority 

provided by the recently enacted PROTECT Act. 

Two thousand predators. Who are they? They include a pediatrician in Chicago 

who had child pornography in his home and date-rape drugs hidden in his car; an 

illegal alien in Texas, convicted of the sexual assault of a child after having been 

deported from the United States on three previous occasions and is now detained 

and serving time in a Federal prison awaiting deportation; and an American citizen 

from Seattle who thought he could avoid justice by flying to Cambodia to engage 

in sex with seven-year-old boys. These are just a few of the faces of Operation Predator. How they came into the custody of ICE is the subject of today’s hearing. 

First, Mr. Chairman, let me give this Subcommittee some context about ICE’s strategic approach to border security and immigration enforcement, which are top 

mission priorities for the Department of Homeland Security. It was from this approach to border security that Operation Predator emerged. 

A year ago this week, ICE was formed by combining the investigative and intelligence arms of the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) and the 

U.S. Customs Service, as well as the Federal Protective Service and the Federal Air 

Marshal Service. By integrating these once-fragmented resources, the Department 

of Homeland Security not only created the second-largest investigative agency in the 

Federal government, but it also created a dynamic and innovative new law enforcement organization uniquely and exclusively focused on homeland security—specifically border security, air security, and economic security. 

The primary mission of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security is to detect and address vulnerabilities in our national security—whether those 

vulnerabilities expose our financial systems to exploitation or our borders to infiltration. With its newfound ability to investigate immigration violations—as well as 

smuggling violations; with its ability to target human smuggling alongside of narcotics, weapons, and other forms of smuggling; and with its ability to follow the illicit money trail wherever it may lead, ICE is in a unique position to enforce border 

security in ways never before possible. 

A good example of this approach was the case in Victoria, Texas, where 19 people, 

including children, were found dead in the back of a tractor-trailer. By combining 

our financial investigation with our immigration authorities, we were able to trace 

the money trail back to the members of the smuggling ring, including its leader, 

who had fled the country. ICE’s investigation led to the arrest and indictment of 

the ringleader and thirteen other co-conspirators. Along the way, we rescued a 

three-year-old boy from this same band of smugglers in an undercover operation and 

arrested his captors. In the process, we created a new model for investigating border 

security crimes, a model that became the centerpiece of our national anti-smuggling 

strategy. 

The Victoria, Texas, case shows how criminal organizations exploit vulnerabilities 

in our border security to smuggle aliens. The crime rings involved might simply be 

seeking profit, but they could just as easily be terrorist rings seeking to infiltrate 

this country. Similarly, the large number of criminal alien absconders, i.e., those 

aliens with unexecuted final orders of deportation who have been convicted of a 

criminal offense, in this nation not only signifies a vulnerability in the nation’s immigration enforcement efforts, it also represents a significant threat in which individuals who entered or remained in the country illegally are freely walking the 

streets. Again, these individuals could be mere administrative fugitives. Or they 

may be something much worse, such as the child predators I have mentioned. And 

while sexual predators are dangerous threats in their own right, we must recognize 

that border vulnerabilities could be exploited for even graver purposes: terrorists 

can—and indeed have—enter the country on false premises, and then simply disappear into the interior. Like every other major initiative at ICE, Operation Predator emerged with these various types of threats in mind. 

Applying a systemic approach to addressing the large number alien absconders, 

ICE set about prioritizing the most dangerous offenders. We first developed a ‘‘Top 

8

Ten’’ list with ‘‘the worst of the worst.’’ While this standard law enforcement tool 

was not regularly employed by the legacy INS, it proved to be a tremendous success 

for ICE. Nine of the original ‘‘Top Ten’’ were located and apprehended within the 

first two weeks, and the tenth was soon confirmed to have left the country. 

This initiative revealed that among the criminal subset of the alien absconder 

population, many have convictions for sexual offenses and, in particular, offenses 

against children. By law, any non-citizen who commits such a crime is to be deported back to his or her home country. Unfortunately, that wasn’t always the case 

under the INS, as you know. This committee has heard too many terrible stories 

about alien predators freed to prey upon children again and again. 

To address this problem, ICE began to examine Megan’s Law directories, matching our immigration databases to Megan’s Law databases, and rounding up deportable aliens convicted of sexual crimes against children. Our success rate was astounding, Mr. Chairman, and we quickly came to recognize the awful dimension of 

the child predator problem. Besides the high number of alien predators, our investigators were unearthing remarkable numbers of child pornographers on the Internet, human smuggling organizations trafficking in children for sexual exploitation, 

and the relatively new phenomenon of ‘‘sex tourists,’’ American citizens who travel 

to other countries to engage in sex with minors. So we coordinated all, systematically. 

As appropriate within ICE’s existing jurisdiction, Operation Predator has grown 

to include U.S. citizens and residents suspected of sex crimes against children. This 

new approach targets child predators by combining our immigration authorities and 

our child pornography authorities to merge efforts in a way that had never been 

done in the past. In a way unforeseeable before the creation of the Department of 

Homeland Security, ICE is coordinating once fragmented resources and underutilized authorities into a united campaign against those who prey upon our children—

drawing on the full range of intelligence, investigative, and detention and removal 

functions of ICE to target those who exploit children. Protecting children from these 

ruthless predators is undoubtedly paramount to our homeland security mission. 

The results of this initiative are unprecedented in law enforcement. The success 

of Operation Predator—as measured by the number of child predators ICE has 

taken off the streets—is a testimony to the tireless work of ICE agents who have 

embraced the integration of the legacy agencies’ legal authorities and used them in 

new and more effective ways. Since Operation Predator was launched in July 2003, 

ICE has arrested more than 2,000 child predators. While this is indeed a worldwide 

enforcement effort, it has a direct impact on the safety of the streets in your local 

communities, as evident in that nearly 1,300 of these arrests occurred in the nine 

states represented by the Members of this Subcommittee. 

Recognizing the synergies realized through our own merger, we aggressively 

sought to incorporate and join forces with others in this important effort. ICE is currently working closely with a number of agencies and organizations under Operation 

Predator. Such cooperation is critical to the success of this initiative, since child 

predator investigations often cross jurisdictional boundaries and require specialized 

assistance to help victims overcome the trauma of their abuse. ICE Operation Predator partners include other DHS agencies such as U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP); state and local police departments, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service; 

the U.S. Department of State Office to Monitor & Combat Trafficking in Persons; 

NCMEC; Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN); INTERPOL; the U.S. 

Department of Justice; and many others who also provide critical support to the program. 

Let me give you a few examples of how our partnerships are working. In January 

2004, ICE formalized a partnership with NCMEC aimed at helping both organizations track down child predators and save potential victims. The partnership allows 

us to coordinate national public campaigns that raise awareness of child exploitation 

crimes, help families learn to better protect their children, and educate the public 

on how to work with ICE to provide valuable tips and take predators off the streets. 

Some of the concrete ways we are working with NCMEC include:

• The National Child Victim Identification System: ICE worked with other 

agencies to create a database to aid local, state, federal, and international law 

enforcement efforts in identifying victims of child exploitation.

• The Amber Alert Program: We have established procedures and the technical 

capability for NCMEC to alert the Federal Air Marshals when it receives an 

‘‘Amber Alert’’ about a suspected kidnapping, endangerment, or abduction of 

children that might involve the commercial aviation system.

9

• The Code Adam Alert Program: The ICE Federal Protective Service is helping 

develop and implement a plan to quickly locate missing children within the 

8,800 federal facilities that it secures.

ICE is also working with INTERPOL to enhance foreign government intelligence 

on criminal child predators. In conjunction with the U.S. National Central Bureau, 

we are developing a mechanism to issue INTERPOL notices to foreign law enforcement agencies whenever ICE deports a convicted sex offender. 

Operation Predator is truly an ICE team effort that employs almost every one of 

ICE’s six operational divisions. ICE Special Agents are on the front lines of our investigative efforts, but other ICE components are critical to the success of this initiative. 

The ICE Law Enforcement Support Center (LESC) is a vital link to our state and 

local partners. The LESC serves as a national enforcement operations and intelligence center by providing timely information on the status and identities of aliens 

suspected, arrested or convicted of criminal activity. The LESC has lodged over 180 

administrative detainers on aliens who have been arrested for Operation Predator 

offenses. Further, leads are sent to the ICE Field Offices for action and the LESC 

coordinates with local law enforcement when the call requires local intervention. A 

prime example of the LESC’s impact was demonstrated in the arrest of a particularly heinous child predator late last summer. In August 2003, the LESC received 

a call on the Predator Hotline. The caller indicated that a 27-year-old Kenyan national, who reportedly is afflicted with AIDS, was having sex with female minors 

in the Boston area. The ICE LESC immediately provided the information to police 

in Lawrence, Massachusetts, who arrested the individual the following day on 

charges of raping a 14-year-old girl in a local apartment. This case represents just 

a single example of how the public can prove to be our most valuable partner. Members of the public are encouraged to call 1–866–DHS–2ICE to report sex offenses 

to ICE. We have also created a dedicated e-mail address at Operation.Predator@dhs.gov to receive tips through e-mail. 

Another ICE asset being brought to bear in Operation Predator is the Cyber 

Crime Center (C3). The Center’s child exploitation section focuses on child pornography and child sex tourism violations that occur on the Internet. C3’s investigative 

specialists are trained to conduct forensic examinations of seized digital storage devices, such as computer hard drives, digital video devices, floppy disks, and backup tapes. Recently, C3 has played a crucial role in an investigation that closed down 

an American-owned beachside resort in Acapulco, Mexico, that catered to child sex 

predators. As a result of this case and others, the Mexican government created a 

task force to address crimes against children in its country. 

The computer investigative expertise that we develop through C3 has played a 

key role in helping us track down Internet-based child predators. In January of this 

year, ICE agents from the Newark Office worked with their partners in the Internal 

Revenue Service, the U.S. Postal Service and the New Jersey U.S. Attorney’s Office 

to bring about the first indictments in connection to what we believe to be the largest Internet child pornography investigation ever undertaken by the U.S. Government. Regpay, a Belarus-based child pornography enterprise, and a Florida credit 

card billing service were indicted in a global Internet pornography and money-laundering scheme involving thousands of paid memberships to some 50 pornography 

websites. Based on this investigation, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of potential targets around the globe that we are investigating. 

A warrant served on the credit card processing server revealed approximately 

70,622 domestic subscriber transactions, as well as 25,597 foreign subscriber transactions. The domestic U.S. transactions were all provided to ICE field offices as enforcement leads, and information on the foreign-based transaction has already been 

passed to law enforcement officials in a number of countries. 

Given the large number of subscriber transactions, the first arrests were 

prioritized by targets we knew had contact with children. Through the investigation, 

ICE has arrested a campus minister at all all-girls school in New Jersey; a seventhgrade schoolteacher on Fresno, California; and a pediatrician in Chicago. The arrests will continue as more of these subscriber transactions are investigated. As this 

case clearly demonstrates, there is no safe haven for child sex predators; wherever 

you operate in the world, we are committed to tracking you down. 

Another example of how we are going beyond our borders to protect children involves the investigation ICE has launched against sex tourism from the U.S. Last 

year, Congress gave law enforcement a powerful new tool by passing the ‘‘Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end the Exploitation of Children Today Act of 

2003’’, or the ‘‘PROTECT Act’’. Under the PROTECT Act, it is a crime for any person to enter the United States, or for a U.S. citizen of lawful permanent resident 

10

to travel abroad, for the purpose of sex tourism involving children. Within a few 

months of President Bush signing the bill into law, ICE had arrested the very first 

offender under the new Act. On September 10, 2003, ICE agents in Seattle arrested 

Michael Clark, a U.S. citizen, on charges of traveling to Cambodia to engage in sex 

with minors. Clark was extradited from Cambodia, upon the request of the U.S., 

after he was arrested and charged by Cambodian police in June with ‘‘debauchery 

involving illicit sexual conduct’’ with boys approximately 10 and 13 years old. According to the criminal complaint filed with the court, Clark subsequently admitted 

to molesting 40 to 50 children. 

ICE is proud to have not only made the first arrest, but also the second, the third 

and now the fourth Protect Act child sex tourism arrest. We have a number of additional ongoing investigations that are being worked by our foreign attache ́s in coordination with local police in places such as Thailand, Cambodia, and the Philippines. Based on these investigations, more arrests are expected. We want to send 

a message loud and clear that international borders no longer shield child sex predators from the law. 

Additional international enforcement cases under the Operation Predator umbrella include cases of human trafficking. One such case involved the dismantling 

of a U.S. adoption agency in which those arrested pled guilty to conspiracy to commit visa fraud and conspiracy to launder money in relation to adoptions of Cambodian children who were not orphans. The object of the trafficking conspiracy was 

to expedite the adoption process for Cambodian children to the United States families. In order to enhance their profits, members of the conspiracy would falsely represent to the U.S. Department of State and DHS that the adopted children were 

orphans, and would falsely represent the identity of the adopted children. The adoptive parents were then fraudulently charged approximately $11,000 for the Immigrant Visas for the adopted children. 

While illegal aliens, lawful permanent residents, and U.S. citizens can all commit 

the type of crime that is the focus of Operation Predator, the vast majority of the 

over 2,000 arrests to date are illegal aliens or lawful permanent residents whose 

crimes make them subject to removal from the United States after being placed in 

immigration removal proceedings. Criminal aliens who have no immigration status, 

or who have been previously ordered deported, can be deported without an immigration court hearing. As part of our overall immigration enforcement strategy, we are 

refocusing our efforts on the Institutional Removal Program (IRP), which is designed to ensure that aliens convicted of crimes in the U.S. are identified, processed, 

and, when possible, removed upon their release from a correctional institution. The 

Fiscal Year (FY) 2005 budget request of an additional $30 million for the IRP will 

further ICE’s plans to expand the program nationally to all Federal, State, and local 

institutions that house criminal aliens. 

Additionally, the FY 2005 budget proposal for ICE includes $50 million to continue the implementation of the ICE National Fugitive Operations Program, established in 2002, which seeks to eliminate the existing backlog and growth of the fugitive alien population over the next six years. Currently, ICE has 18 Fugitive Operations Teams deployed throughout the country and can report that approximately 

6,000 fugitives have been apprehended and nearly 700 additional criminal aliens 

have been apprehended in connection with fugitive operations teams. The FY 2005 

budget request would fund an additional 30 teams to locate these potential threats 

to public safety. Overall, the President’s Budget request includes increases of $186 

million for ICE to fund improvements in immigration enforcement that will prove 

critical to the continued and expanded ICE effort to combat the public safety threat 

posed by illegal aliens in our country. 

On March 1, 2004, we celebrated the one-year anniversary of the Department of 

Homeland Security—and ICE. Clearly, we have seen that the merging of the legacy 

mission and authorities in ICE allows a multi-disciplined approach to homeland security that is crucial to our efforts to safeguard America—especially our children. 

Through Operation Predator, ICE is working diligently to implement the President’s 

goal of eradicating the ‘‘special evil in the abuse and exploitation of the most innocent and vulnerable.’’ Thank you for the opportunity to testify today on this important topic and I am eager to work with Congress to provide the American people 

with the level of security they demand and deserve. I look forward to your questions.

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Thank you, Secretary Garcia. At this time, I 

will turn to the Ranking Member, the gentlelady from Texas, Ms. 

Jackson Lee, for an opening statement. 

11

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And 

thank you for calling this enormously important hearing. We know 

that Mr. Garcia has exhibited enormous commitment to this issue, 

and we thank him for his testimony. 

I guess, if I had to give him a good day today, it would be the 

opportunity to sit next to John Walsh. People ask the question, 

‘‘Why John Walsh, and why in the United States Congress?’’ Mr. 

Chairman, because John Walsh gets things done. And I’m very 

pleased to have both his—if I might say, his yesterdays and his tomorrows are part of our army, if you will, to fight against the heinousness of those who prey upon our children. 

One thing that I’ve noted is that, as your testimony proceeded, 

Mr. Garcia, this is an international issue. And how horrific to find 

that any American would leave these shores to go elsewhere to 

prey upon children. That means that our reach is international, 

and the work of this Committee, Mr. Chairman—and I thank you 

for your leadership—is crucial. 

I chair the Congressional Children’s Caucus. And we have 

worked with many in our Congress, including Congressman Nick 

Lampson, who heads the Missing and Exploiting Children’s Caucus. We try to work together and be noticeably in place on some 

of these tragedies. 

On July 9, 2003, the Department of Homeland Security’s Bureau 

of Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced the implementation of Operation Predator. Operation Predator is a comprehensive initiative designed to enhance our government’s efforts 

to protect children from pornographers, child prostitution rings, 

Internet predators, alien smugglers, human traffickers, and other 

criminals. It has coordinated the department’s once fragmented investigative and intelligence resources into a united campaign 

against child predators. 

As a slight anecdotal story, in keeping with respect for the family, many of us can just see some of the images of a very young 

girl in Florida; the videotape that was shown when a despicable individual approached her, in her innocence. Any of us that have 

even a semblance of heart and mind felt that pain. So this program 

directly involves and engages itself with that kind of heinous act. 

This is an extremely important program, and I agree with the 

statement that Assistant Secretary Michael Garcia made when Operation Predator was announced: There is nothing more important 

than protecting our children, the future of our nation. 

I also agree with what John Walsh said that day, when he 

thanked Secretary Ridge and the Department of Homeland Security for its efforts to increase the protection of America’s children. 

Mr. Walsh said, ‘‘Child predators are everywhere, and they are 

cunning.’’

It gives me tremendous hope that the future will be even brighter and safer for kids everywhere, thanks in part to Operation Predator. Since Operation Predator was implemented in July 2003, Federal agents have arrested more than 2,000 suspected child sex offenders in a nationwide undercover investigation that has targeted 

child pornography purveyors and other predatory criminals. It has 

taken child pornography suspects into custody in nearly every 

State and every major city. It has arrested U.S. citizens who are 

12

accused of traveling overseas to meet with children for sex, others 

who are accused of molesting mentally impaired children, and people who are accused of smuggling foreign children into the United 

States to serve as prostitutes. Approximately 400 of the people 

taken into custody were charged with manufacturing or distributing child pornography on the Internet. 

In addition to those arrests, agents have identified more than 

250 children featured in child pornography digital images for State 

and local agencies; and responded to more than 140 calls on ICE’s 

toll-free hotline, allowing the public to report information about 

suspected child sex offenders and other child predators. 

Last month, Federal and local authorities rounded up almost 30 

legal and illegal immigrants who’ve been convicted of sex crimes. 

All of those arrested have been convicted of a felony, sex crimes, 

and sentenced to probation. Twenty-five of them have been convicted of crimes involving child victims. 

These included a man from Mexico with a conviction for abusing 

his 4- and 7-year-old nieces, a Guatemalan man convicted of molesting his girlfriend’s 10-year-old daughter, a man from Peru convicted of raping a 14-year-old girl, and a Dominican man convicted 

of sodomizing a 13-year-old girl. 

It has been known and stated in the continent of Africa that certain cultural attitudes are that if an old man has relationships 

with a very young girl, that provides him with longevity and good 

health. These are issues that impact on the United States of America. Children are part of the world family. 

The depravity of some of the sex offenders is unbelievable. Several days ago, a 41-year-old man was arrested for distributing videotape footage of himself committing sex acts on a 2-month-old infant. Agents of Operation Predator had traced him through his email. He faces a prison term of up to 50 years for making and sending child pornography. 

We had a sting in Houston just about a year or two ago where 

a large network of sex offenders using the computer were arrested—people like your neighbors and friends. This gentleman is 

in jail without bond. Another man was arrested by Operation Predator agents last month for a similar offense. The case involves a 

59-year-old man who was arrested for allegedly videotaping himself 

having sex with an 11-year-old girl who appears to have been 

drugged or intoxicated. Inside the man’s house, the agents found 

what appeared to them to be a kiddy-porn studio. His bed was covered with stuffed animals and surrounded by cameras. 

Nevertheless, I do have some concerns. Operation Predator must 

employ—must employ—not employ unfair immigration laws that 

sometimes produce harsh, unwanted results. We want the culprit. 

We want to make sure that we ensure that that is the case. The 

culprit we want; and we also want to make sure we’re balanced. 

The section that I’m concerned about defines sexual abuse of a 

minor as an aggravated felony, which is vague enough to encompass people who should not be treated as sexual predators. And 

that’s why we’re having this hearing: to ensure that we get our person, whoever it might be. We must be careful to ensure that people 

who are caught up in the national sweep to rid our country of predVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:14 May 21, 2004 Jkt 089266 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 G:\WORK\IMMIG\030404\92347.000 HJUD1 PsN: 92347
13

atory criminal aliens are predators. I believe that as we have this 

hearing, we can do the right thing. 

Let me close, Mr. Chairman, by first of all saying I’m gratified 

that we’ve had this opportunity for review. I look forward to us discussing an opportunity as well to hold an asylum hearing, or issues 

dealing with asylum, dealing with the Haitian crisis that’s going on 

right now, and I look forward to that. 

I believe that Congress can pass laws that will work. When I 

first came to Congress, I passed a date rape drug bill that was a 

direct result of adults preying upon children, teenagers, in a teenage club that had Kool-Aid. And the adults would put the date rape 

drug in it, and of course tragedy would occur. We’ve worked on the 

issue of child soldiers, and we’ve seen a difference in the number 

of young people taken across national lines and use of child soldiers. We can do something. 

And so I’m grateful for this hearing, so that we can do more, and 

I’m grateful for the witnesses. And I thank you very much for your 

kindness. I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Jackson Lee follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE SHEILA JACKSON LEE, A REPRESENTATIVE

IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS

On July 9, 2003, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (BICE) announced the implementation of Operation Predator. Operation Predator is a comprehensive initiative designed to enhance our government’s efforts to protect children from pornographers, child prostitution rings, Internet predators, alien smugglers, human traffickers, and other 

criminals. It has coordinated the Department’s once-fragmented investigative and 

intelligence resources into a united campaign against child predators. 

This is an extremely important program. I agree with the statement that Assistant Secretary Michael Garcia made when Operation Predator was announced. 

‘‘There is nothing more important than protecting our children—the future of our 

nation.’’ I also agree with what John Walsh said that day when he thanked Secretary Ridge and the Department of Homeland Security for its efforts to increase 

the protection of America’s children. Mr. Wash said, ‘‘Child Predators are everywhere; and they are cunning. It gives me tremendous hope that the future will be 

even brighter and safer for kids everywhere thanks in part to Operation Predator.’’

Since Operation Predator was implemented in July of 2003, federal agents have 

arrested more than 2,000 suspected child-sex offenders in a nationwide undercover 

investigation that has targeted child-pornography purveyors and other predatory 

criminals. It has taken child pornography suspects into custody in nearly every state 

and every major city. It has arrested U.S. citizens who were accused of traveling 

overseas to meet with children for sex, others who were accused of molesting mentally impaired children, and people who were accused of smuggling foreign children 

into the United States to serve as prostitutes. 

Approximately 400 of the people taken into custody were charged with manufacturing or distributing child pornography on the Internet. In addition to these arrests, agents have identified more than 250 children featured in child pornography 

digital images for state and local police agencies, and responded to more than 140 

calls on ICE’s toll-free hot line, allowing the public to report information about suspected child-sex offenders and other child predators. 

Last month, federal and local authorities rounded up almost 30 legal and illegal 

immigrants who have been convicted of sex crimes. All of those arrested have been 

convicted of a felony sex crimes and sentenced to probation. Twenty-five of them 

have been convicted of crimes involving child victims. These included a man from 

Mexico with a conviction for abusing his 4- and 7-year-old nieces; a Guatemalan 

man convicted of molesting his girlfriend’s 10-year-old daughter; a man from Peru 

convicted of raping a 14-year-old girl; and a Dominican man convicted of sodomizing 

a 13-year-old girl. 

The depravity of some of the sex offenders is unbelievable. Several days ago, a 

41-year-old man was arrested for distributing videotaped footage of himself committing sex acts on a two-month-old infant. Agents of Operation Predator had traced 

14

him through his email. He faces a prison term of up to 50 years for making and 

sending child pornography. He is in jail without bond. 

Another man was arrested by Operation Predator agents last month for a similar 

offense. This case involves a 59-year-old man who was arrested for allegedly videotaping himself having sex with an 11-year-old girl who appears to have been 

drugged or intoxicated. Inside the man’s house, the agents found what appeared to 

them to be a kiddie porn studio. His bed was covered with stuffed animals and surrounded by cameras. 

Nevertheless, I do have some concerns. Unfortunately, Operation Predator must 

employ unfair immigration laws that sometimes produce harsh, unwarranted results. For instance, section 101(a)(43)(A) of the Immigration and Nationality Act defines ‘‘sexual abuse of a minor’’ as an aggravated felony, which is vague enough to 

encompass people who should not be treated as sexual predators. We must be careful to ensure that the people who are caught up in the national sweep to rid our 

country of predatory criminal aliens really are predators. Thank you.

Mr. HOSTETTLER. I thank the gentlelady. 

In July 1981, Mr. John Walsh and his wife, Reve Walsh, lost 

their son Adam to an abductor. Adam was later found murdered. 

The story of Adam and the Walshes’ tragedy was dramatized in the 

1983 NBC made-for-television movie ‘‘Adam.’’ The movie highlighted a number of missing children, leading to the eventual recovery of 65 children. Mr. Walsh then became the host of the country’s 

prime crime-fighting show, ‘‘America’s Most Wanted: America 

Fights Back.’’ The Walshes didn’t leave it at that, however. They have crusaded 

on a number of occasions in Congress for legislation to combat child 

abduction, including the Missing Children Act of 1982 and the 

Missing Children’s Assistance Act of 1984. This legislation helped 

create the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, of 

which Mr. Walsh remains a board member. 

As we have heard, NCMEC has signed an important memorandum of understanding with ICE to assist in identifying and arresting child predators. Mr. Walsh has been very supportive of Operation Predator and ICE. Last year, John Walsh was quoted as 

saying about ICE’s program, ‘‘Operation Predator,’’ ‘‘I think this 

sends a loud message to pedophiles, who know no borders, especially illegal aliens that come here that molest children, serve time 

in our prisons, and then are released: You cannot stay in the 

United States.’’ Mr. Walsh is a graduate of the University of Buffalo. 

Mr. Walsh, on a personal note, as a father, I cannot begin to 

comprehend the depth of loss that you and your wife Reve experienced in 1981. If it is some small comfort to you, I can say, however, without hesitation, that the moms and dads that serve in this 

body and all of us that serve in the United States Congress, as well 

as the rest of the country, believe that America’s children and, as 

Mr. Garcia has pointed out, now we know, the world’s children, are 

safer because you are on the job. Thank you very much. And the 

floor is yours, sir. 

STATEMENT OF JOHN WALSH, CHAIRMAN OF THE NATIONAL 

ADVISORY BOARD OF THE NATIONAL CENTER FOR MISSING 

AND EXPLOITED CHILDREN; HOST OF ‘‘AMERICA’S MOST 

WANTED: AMERICA FIGHTS BACK’’

Mr. WALSH. Thank you so much for the introduction, Chairman 

Hostettler; very gracious, and I really appreciate it. I want to 

thank you and your Committee for, you know, allowing us to come 

15

here today and tell the ICE story. I think good works need to be 

acknowledged, and people need to know that there are resources. 

Before I start, I really wanted to thank Representative Sheila 

Jackson Lee for all her great work here in the United States Congress. She is a loud, loud voice for children, as the Chair of the 

Children’s Caucus, and she has an outstanding record of speaking 

for those who can’t speak. The silent majority here in the United 

States are children. And she’s done a great job. 

And I really support her piece of legislation to create a national 

DNA registry of sex offenders. This has been a problem for years, 

that we have identified predators; we know that they have many, 

many victims. Some States still don’t allow us to take DNA. Why 

can’t we, when someone is convicted of a felony, take their DNA, 

run it through her legislative piece of—the DNA bank—and find 

out if this person is wanted somewhere else, if they’ve committed 

crimes somewhere else? It’s a great piece of legislation. And it 

would also free people that are innocent, people that have been 

charged of crimes. If the DNA doesn’t match up or someone’s in jail 

for something, we can run the DNA and find out if they’re innocent. 

But I didn’t mean to get sidetracked. But I just want to commend 

you. You and I are on the same page, as it relates to children. 

We’re on the same page, with sexual predators, in allowing law enforcement to access that DNA bank and to get these people off the 

street. I just had to put in my two cents about all your work, and 

I really appreciate it. 

You know, I’ve been up here, coming up here, for 22 years. I’ve 

been before so many Committees and testified on both sides, the 

House and the Senate, on numerous occasions. And this is the first 

time that I’m here not asking for something or trying to get you 

to do something; because you have done it. And Congressman 

Flake, I’m glad you could come back here, and I want to thank you 

for taking your time today to be here, because this sends a loud 

message that we can change things. 

And instead of being here and saying, you know, ‘‘This doesn’t 

work,’’ and ‘‘We need this piece of legislation,’’ and ‘‘We need more 

money’’—money is always, you know, a concern, and a legitimate 

concern; and I think homeland security probably does need more 

money—but I’m here today to say this Operation Predator and this 

ICE team, it works. It works. Two thousand predators off the street 

since July 9. It’s incredible. 

They have put together agencies, Mike Garcia and the people 

that work with him and Tom Ridge, that have been battling for 

years. When I first started ‘‘America’s Most Wanted,’’ the first 

show, I’ll never forget, there were three law enforcement agencies 

in that studio, that were looking for the same fugitive, that 

wouldn’t talk to each other. I had to introduce them to each other 

and say, ‘‘You’re looking for the same guy. Who cares who gets the 

credit? Who cares who gets the picture in the paper or the 15 seconds on the news? You guys have to drop these turf wars and these 

egos, and go after this guy.’’ That’s what ICE does. 

ICE has put together Immigrations, Customs, Border Patrol: all 

these agencies that I’ve been after for years, to hunt down sexual 

predators, and especially international predators. I’ll never forget 

16

begging the State Department to go after a dentist, a pedophile 

dentist, who was going to Costa Rica, sodomizing young boys, making videos of it, making pictures, and trading and selling them on 

the Internet. No one would listen to me. ‘‘Well, we can’t do it. It’s 

not in our jurisdiction.’’ We chased an international pedophile by the name of—oh, God, 

he was on the FBI’s Top Ten—Eric Rosser. He used to play keyboards for John Mellencamp and run piano schools in Indiana. He 

would go to Thailand and molest little girls. He bought a 9-yearold girl and made a video of himself raping this girl, to bring back 

to the United States and sell. 

For years, I couldn’t get anyone interested; and finally appealed 

to the FBI Director, Louis Freeh, and said, ‘‘You have five sons. 

You can’t tell me that this wouldn’t affect you if this happened to 

your child.’’ And by all that coercing and bringing it—why did I 

have to do that? Why did I have to get the FBI to put a predator 

on their Top Ten list, when this guy was traveling back and forth 

all over the world? And we finally caught him in Thailand, after 

he had plastic surgery and 40 pounds of liposuction, because of an 

American woman who was there and he tried to apply to her school 

to be a school teacher so he could prey upon little girls. 

It has been so hard over these years to get these agencies to do 

their damn job. It has been near impossible to convince them to go 

outside of the United States to hunt down these creeps. To be in 

the United States is a privilege. This is a great country. This is a 

wonderful, powerful country. And I’m sure all of us sitting here 

come from some type of immigrant background. But if you come 

into the United States and you prey upon our children; and you’re 

sent to a State, local, or Federal jail; and you do your time. And 

a condition of your parole—which is a privilege, parole and probation is a privilege—the condition of that is you leave this country; 

and you go like this [gestures], ‘‘The hell with America;’’ and you 

stay here, you stay in this country and violate all our rules, violate 

the principles of this country: It’s beyond arrogance, it’s illegal. And 

until ICE came along, I couldn’t get any Federal agency involved 

in hunting these people down. 

I’ll never forget when we caught a child predator. He had one ton 

of child pornography. He was arrested; he did his time; and that 

one ton of child pornography went into the sheriff’s unit in southern California. It went into a storage unit. I asked the FBI, I asked 

all different agencies, ‘‘Why don’t you look at that child pornography and see if any of those kids are missing kids? You could 

charge this guy with kidnapping. What if these kids were murdered?’’ ‘‘We don’t have the time. We don’t have the resources.’’ He 

had the audacity 10 years ago to get a lawyer, an ACLU lawyer, 

who sued the sheriff to get that child pornography back. It sat in 

that storage unit for over 2 years, and he did get it back. No one 

looked at it. No one had the time; no one had the resources. And 

that predator got out on probation. God knows where he is now, because there was no Megan’s Law. 

These guys work with the National Center. The National Center 

last year looked at 600,000 images of child pornography. And who 

did they turn to? ICE. They turned to ICE and said, ‘‘Here, these 

are the children that are being preyed upon. These are the people 

17

we think are the predators. We don’t know who this predator is.’’ ICE said, ‘‘We’ll do it.’’ Mike Garcia came to me, and Tom Ridge. I didn’t have to go to 

them and say, ‘‘Dammit, use these resources. Do your job. You’re 

supposed to be in charge of homeland security and terrorists. A 

child predator, an international child predator, is a terrorist. He’s 

preying upon our children. And if you’re a 6-year-old child that’s 

being sodomized and raped and being photographed, you’re terrified. That person is a terrorist.’’ They came to me. 

They came to the National Center and said, ‘‘We can do this. We 

can do it. We have the resources. We’re going to get over the turf 

battles. We’re going to get over the turf wars. We’re going to make 

these agencies work together. And you know what we’re going to 

do? We’re going to hunt these low-lifes down. We’re going to put 

them in jail, or we’re going to take them across the border where 

they belong; send them back to their country of origin. And we’re 

going to create a website. We’re going to exchange information. 

We’re going to access Megan’s Law.’’ I went to a child murder in El Paso, Texas, where the two detectives, God bless them. This is a little girl that was kidnapped out 

of a Wal-Mart. You could see it on the video. It was as chilling as 

Carli Brucia, the little girl that was taken in Sarasota. I said to 

the two detectives, I said, ‘‘You see how he lured her out of the 

store, and he didn’t hold her hand? He said—he had her walk behind him, in case someone came up to him. The video picked them 

up out in the parking lot.’’ I said, ‘‘You know what? This guy is a 

predator. I’ll bet he’s a repeat offender, and I’ll bet he’s registered 

in Megan’s Law. He’s in your sex offender registry.’’ And they both 

looked at me and said, ‘‘What’s Megan’s Law? What’s a sex offender 

registry?’’ I said, ‘‘You should be looking at every convicted sex offender that lives within 10 miles of where this kidnapping occurred.’’ They said, ‘‘Well, you know what, Mr. Walsh? We don’t 

have much evidence. The 5-year-old girl was naked, her face was 

burned, and there’s no DNA.’’ And I said, ‘‘You know, let me tell 

you something. Why he burned her face was to destroy evidence. 

Whatever he did to her, he did in her face. You need a forensic 

team down here.’’ I had to beg a forensic team to come from Dallas, 

from the FBI. 

They took the charred first layer of skin off of her forehead, and 

there was a handprint. That handprint was of a predator who was 

registered in Megan’s Law, a sex offender who was out on parole. 

He lived two miles from that little girl. I had to go down there and 

tell these two cops how to do their job. I had to tell them about 

Megan’s Law. I had to tell them there was a sex offender registry, 

that there were resources available. 

This group came to me. They came to us at ‘‘America’s Most 

Wanted.’’ They came to the National Center and said, ‘‘We’ll hunt 

these low-lifes down. We’ll get them. We’ll use the resources. We’ll 

use the technology of the 21st century. We’ll start a website.’’

They know what they’re doing. I know the Congresswoman’s concerns about how we treat our aliens, our immigrants. They have 

those same concerns. I’ve ridden with them. I’ve ridden on that border. I’ve sat there all night on horses with the Border Patrol, who 

sit there in that dangerous desert at night, all night, looking for 

18

illegal smugglers of human bodies, of drugs, of weapons; al Qaeda 

terrorists who try to come into the country. I’ve ridden in their 

Black Hawk helicopters; I’ve gone on their ATV’s; I’ve gone in their 

Hummers. They treat these people with dignity. 

They save lives on the border. Illegal smugglers will bring poor, 

innocent Mexicans who’ve paid them $1,500 and, the minute they 

think they’re going to get caught, leave them to die in the desert. 

I’ve been with them when they’ve come up on women and children 

that are absolutely dehydrated, on the verge of death. They give 

them water, medical treatment and treat them with great dignity. 

I’ve seen it firsthand. Saved their lives. 

Those concerns are legitimate, but I’ve watched it first-hand. I’ve 

watched how these agents handle these illegal immigrants, these 

aliens. They give them the respect that this country is known for. 

But they also send a loud, clear message: You want the privilege 

of coming here? Behave. Obey the law. If you molest a child or hurt 

a child in this country, we’re going to hunt you down. And if you 

have the audacity and nerve to serve time in our prisons and come 

out, and not leave the country, ICE is going to hunt you down. 

You’re going to do more time, and we’re going to take you in chains 

back to that country where you came from. 

They’ve done a hell of a job: Two thousand predators. Two thousand. It’s taken me 16 years on ‘‘America’s Most Wanted,’’ with the 

help of millions of people, to catch 780 fugitives and bring back 34 

missing children—one of them, Elizabeth Smart. Millions and 

zillions of dollars of Fox money, lots of effort, to hunt down these 

780 fugitives worldwide, 15 off the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted. They’ve 

caught 2,000—2,000 low-life dirtbags in 1 year. Should get a 

medal. I really mean that. They should get a medal. 

If they need more money, give it to them. If they need more resources, give it to them. Because I spent 22 years begging these different agencies to do the damn job that they were initiated to do. 

I couldn’t get them to go outside the borders. I couldn’t get them 

to do it. It wasn’t sexy enough. ‘‘Let’s put John Gotti in jail. Let’s 

put Michael Milliken and Ivan Boesky in jail.’’ They don’t get 

enough credit for that low-life pedophile that might be the school 

bus driver that sodomizes your daughter when she’s the last one 

off the bus. They ought to down that guy. 

Maybe it’s not sexy; maybe it doesn’t get a lot of publicity. But 

you know what? They’re making streets a lot safer for all of our 

children. When you mention so many people on both sides of the 

aisle in both Houses up here that have children, these are the people that are out there day and night hunting these low-lifes down. 

I’d be willing to answer any of your questions. But what they 

have done with the Child PROTECT Act, what they have done with 

the legislation, they didn’t wait for a Committee to say, ‘‘Go do it. 

Why the hell aren’t you doing it? Why don’t you do it?’’ They didn’t 

come up with any excuses, ‘‘I can’t. My hands are tied. It doesn’t 

meet this. I can’t do it. It’s out of my jurisdiction.’’ I never heard 

one of those complaints. They said, ‘‘We’ll do it. We’ll do it legally; 

we’ll do it ethically; we’ll do it morally; we’ll do it to the letter of 

the law. But we’ll do it. We’ll go out and do it.’’

I’m honored to be here today. It’s my first trip up here that I’m 

not saying, ‘‘Why the hell aren’t you doing your job?’’ or ‘‘Give us 

19

something.’’ I’m honored to be here today, and I’m honored that you 

take the time. And I wish all the Members were here. I hope they 

aren’t at some lobbyist’s lunch somewhere raising funds, because 

this is an important hearing. 

I’m honored to be here; that you’re saying, ‘‘What can we do? 

What can we do to help you?’’ Do your job; we’ll monitor it. You’re 

the people that allow this guy and the people that he works with 

to operate, to make the streets safer. You allow him to go there, 

by your legislation. Your support of the Child PROTECT Act gave 

him the wherewithal to go out and round up, to saddle up and get 

these guys. 

You do a good job, and this guy follows your mandate, he and 

all the men and women who work for him. And all those different 

agencies have now been sent one loud message: The turf battles, 

the ego, and the credit, it’s over. Let’s just go get ’em. 

I’m honored to be here. Thanks for having me. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Walsh follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF JOHN WALSH

Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of the Subcommittee: 

Thank you for this opportunity to appear before your Subcommittee today to 

present the views of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children concerning OPERATION PREDATOR. Mr. Chairman, you have long been a champion 

on behalf of children and I commend you and the members of this Subcommittee 

for your tireless efforts that continue to greatly enhance the safety and protection 

of America’s children. I thank you for your recognition of these critical issues that 

are targeted by the Department of Homeland Security through OPERATION PREDATOR and also for your continued and generous support of the Congressionally 

mandated role that the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children implements everyday on behalf of our children and families. 

Mr. Chairman, let me also express my deep appreciation to Secretary Ridge, Assistant Secretary, Michael J. Garcia, and the Department of Homeland Security for 

targeting those individuals who sexually exploit our children. While we live in a 

country where there are more than 400,000 registered sex offenders, there are many 

thousands who have not registered. The majority of America’s victims of sexual offenses are children. One in five girls, one in ten boys, but only one in three will 

report their victimization. A recent article in Tass reported evidence that increasingly organized criminals and terrorist groups are using child pornography as a 

source of revenue—why? Because children are plentiful and easy to obtain, it is inexpensive to produce, the profits are high, and the risks are very low. In light of 

the Supreme Court’s 2002 decision on virtual child pornography, identifying who the 

children who are depicted in child pornography is of vital importance. The National 

Center for Missing and Exploited Children is pleased to work with the Bureau of 

Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other agencies to build a resource to address this vital concern. 

Mr. Chairman, since the launch of OPERATION PREDATOR on July 9, 2003, the 

Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (hereinafter ‘‘ICE’’) has arrested 

over 1,700 child predators and sex offenders. This comprehensive initiative by the 

Department of Homeland Security (hereinafter ‘‘DHS’’) to protect children worldwide 

is to be applauded. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children is honored to be a part of this coordinated, comprehensive effort to attack the problem and 

bring those who prey upon our children to justice. The National Center for Missing 

and Exploited Children has a long history of partnership with agencies now a part 

of DHS. We have worked hand-in-hand with the U.S. Customs Service on child pornography since 1987. We are proud of our decade-long partnership with the U.S. Secret Service since 1994. The Secret Service has provided forensic support and a wide 

array of other technical and human support in missing and exploited child cases. 

This administration has made child protection a priority. In October of 2002, 

President Bush hosted the first-ever White House Conference on Missing and Exploited Children. Today, the federal government is doing more than at any other 

time in its history to make the sexual exploitation of children a priority throughout 

our federal criminal enforcement agencies. We are pleased to be a part of an unprecedented partnership with DHS, ICE, the FBI, the Postal Inspection Service, the SeVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:14 May 21, 2004 Jkt 089266 PO 00000 Frm 00023 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 G:\WORK\IMMIG\030404\92347.000 HJUD1 PsN: 92347
20

cret Service, the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section at the Department of Justice, and more than 40 Internet Crimes Against Children Task Forces across the 

country, working together to identify children in child pornography and keep every 

child safe from the horror of sexual exploitation. 

In order to enhance our partnership and effectiveness in meeting the goals of OPERATION PREDATOR, on January 29 of this year, the National Center for Missing 

and Exploited Children and the Department of Homeland Security’s U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement entered into a Cooperative Agreement outlining various protocols that will greatly enhance the cooperation and effectiveness in support 

of this important initiative. Signed by Homeland Assistant Secretary Michael J. 

Garcia and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s President, 

Ernie Allen, this memorandum of understanding will expand the ongoing cooperative efforts between the two organizations. As a part of that agreement, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children will furnish ICE with evidence 

and leads it receives on child pornography and suspected child sex violators through 

its national CyberTipline {1–800–843–5678 or cybertipline.com}. In addition, ICE 

has agreed to provide the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children with 

access to child pornography images and identifying information contained in ICE’s 

data systems to assist the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children with 

its efforts to locate missing and exploited children. 

This agreement also calls for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to alert ICE’s Federal Air Marshal Service (FAMS) when the organization receives an ‘‘Amber Alert’’ about the kidnapping, endangerment, or abduction of children that might involve the aviation domain. This action complements the new Code 

Adam Alert Program that requires all federal facilities to have a plan to quickly locate missing children. 

This agreement marks an official collaboration and partnership that takes place 

at two levels:

1. The sharing of information to help track down child predators and possibly 

save victims.

2. A national public campaign to raise awareness about the facts behind child 

exploitation crimes, how families can protect their children, and how the 

public can work with ICE to provide tips and take predators off the streets.

To date, both U.S. citizens and non-U.S. citizens have been arrested, prosecuted, 

and/or sentenced under OPERATION PREDATOR, including the following;

• Non-citizen child sex offenders whose crimes made them subject to deportation

• U.S. residents who traveled abroad to engage in sex with minors

• Individuals who molested mentally-impaired minors

• Individuals who used the Internet to lure minors to engage in sex with them

• Individuals who smuggled foreign minors into this country to work as prostitutes

• Individuals who manufactured or distributed child pornography via the Internet

Mr. Chairman, the synergies realized from the partnerships created under OPERATION PREDATOR will save the lives of children, save children and families from 

the horror of sexual exploitation, and bring to justice those who would prey on our 

most vulnerable population. OPERATION PREDATOR through its partnership with 

the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and other agencies has in 

a very short time:

• Established a single web portal to access all publicly available state Megan’s 

Law databases

• Created a National Child Victim Identification System with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children

• Agents that are stationed internationally that are working with foreign governments and their law enforcement counterparts to enhance coordination 

and cooperation on crimes that cross borders

• Working with INTERPOL to enhance foreign government intelligence on 

criminal child predators

Mr. Chairman, I very much appreciate the opportunity to appear before this Committee today and would be pleased to answer any questions the Committee might 

have on these matters.

21

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Thank you, Mr. Walsh, very much. And the 

questions I have to ask, Mr. Secretary, are less than redundant 

after that endorsement; but I will do my job, nonetheless. And all 

this Committee, this Subcommittee, and Congress, seconds Mr. 

Walsh’s sentiment that in fact it is you and your employees, the 

men and women of ICE, that are making the streets safer, that are 

doing the job that we’ve asked you to do. 

Your assistant, Mr. Dougherty, last week gave a very good rationale for the increase in funds that the President has asked for 

your department. I think it is a good first step, but it is just that. 

It is just a first step in giving you the resources, the increased resources, that you need to continue and expand on the good job that 

you’ve done. 

Mr. Secretary, your testimony explained how local law enforcement officers have been cooperative in providing leads on alien 

child sex predators they have in custody, so they can be removed 

after serving their sentence. Are there certain localities that refuse 

to provide immigration status of sexual predators that they have 

in custody? 

Mr. GARCIA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We have seen an issue 

in terms of cooperation or statements being made in terms of free 

zones or areas where the immigration laws wouldn’t be enforced; 

statements by some local political leaders to that effect. That has 

not been the case in terms of child sex predators. 

I think this is one area where we can all agree that it’s necessary 

to work together to provide the information to get that to ICE, so 

that we could take the steps necessary to make sure those predators don’t get out of that local facility and get back on the streets 

where they can harm a child. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Very good. As you may be aware, Mr. Secretary, the CLEAR Act, introduced by our colleague, Charlie Norwood of Georgia, would provide further resources for cooperative 

local law enforcement agencies to enforce the country’s immigration 

laws. In your opinion, would the CLEAR Act, if enacted, be useful 

in assisting ICE and Operation Predator with identifying and removing alien sexual predators or other alien criminals? 

Mr. GARCIA. Again, Mr. Chairman, I’ve seen some of the CLEAR 

Act legislation, and I understand the need for further State and 

local cooperation. But I think particularly in this area where we’re 

talking about violent criminals, what I’ve seen as the—where it 

slips through the cracks has been in the resource issue on the fact 

that we have so many local facilities across the United States, local 

penitentiaries, State and Federal, leveraging those assets in terms 

of providing a feed into ICE, making sure we can get the coverage 

out there. 

In some cases, it’ll take us 8 hours to get to a local facility to 

process an alien. And it’s obviously very important work, but we 

need to be looking at how do we do that through a central facility; 

which we’re doing through closed-circuit TV and other technology 

that can ensure our reach. 

So really, in the case of predators and violent offenders, it’s that 

mechanism we need to develop for linking those local enforcement 

officials, local prison folks, up with our people, so we can make 

sure that that hand-off takes place, that that connection takes 

22

place; to ensure, again, that we don’t see sexual predators, particularly predators who prey on children, slipping through the cracks 

of the system. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Very good. One of the press releases mentioned 

that a foreign national was sentenced by a Federal judge in September for smuggling Mexican children into the U.S. to work as 

forced prostitutes. How widespread is this problem, in your perception? 

Mr. GARCIA. Unfortunately, Mr. Chairman, we’ve been seeing 

this come up more frequently recently. You mentioned that case. 

We’ve had others involving the smuggling of Mexican children into 

the U.S. I think we’re seeing a new focus in this area, new dedication to rescuing these children and making these cases. 

And again, to get to your point, working with those local officials, 

who are in many cases the first responders to a house where children may be held; educating them on the other part of that puzzle, 

the fact that these people have brought those children across the 

border, that organized criminal enterprises are exploiting those 

children for profit and bringing them into the U.S. I do think it’s 

a big problem, and I think the fact that we’ve been seeing more 

cases recently within the past few months is highlighting that fact. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. And then finally, Mr. Secretary, how many of 

those apprehended under Operation Predator have been deported, 

and how many are still currently in the process? 

Mr. GARCIA. Mr. Chairman, unfortunately, that’s a difficult number to provide. In terms of that statistic, we’ve almost been a victim 

of our own success in a way, because we’ve had so many people 

come into the system, and are now putting in place the technology 

to track that automatically and see where they are in terms of the 

deportation proceeding. 

We have deported hundreds of sexual predators since July, since 

the time that this initiative was launched. Matching those to the 

dates and where we are in the process is somewhat difficult. And 

one of the things we’re working very hard on now: to capture that 

data in meaningful ways so we have those statistics real-time, in 

terms of deportation, the categories, the Megan’s List folks we’re 

picking up off the street, so we can provide that data. But we’ll 

have that on an ongoing basis, and I’ll be happy to get that to the 

Committee as we develop it. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Very good. Thank you. 

Mr. Walsh, in your testimony, your written testimony, you refer 

to a Supreme Court decision in 2002—I believe it’s the case 

Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition—that requires prosecutors to 

prove that someone has posted actual real, as opposed to digitally 

enhanced, pictures of a child, to prove a crime took place. What has 

that decision, that Supreme Court decision, done for the morale of 

your non-governmental organization? And what can be done to 

minimize this blow to combatting child sex abuse? 

Mr. WALSH. Well, most of that revolves around the Supreme 

Court not dealing with the issue of virtual child pornography. Virtual child pornography is the creation of a fantasy, whatever you 

want to call it, that looks like a real man, looks like a real person, 

sodomizing or raping a 5- or 6-year-old child. Who is interested in 

that? I don’t think anybody up there at that Committee is interVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:14 May 21, 2004 Jkt 089266 PO 00000 Frm 00026 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 G:\WORK\IMMIG\030404\92347.000 HJUD1 PsN: 92347
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ested in downloading virtual child pornography. It looks so real. It 

looks like a real man sodomizing that little boy. It looks like a real 

man raping that little girl. It is virtual child pornography. 

And the Supreme Court justices, in their wonderful way of trying 

to protect first amendment and freedom of press, somewhere got 

confused along the line and said, ‘‘You know, virtual child pornography is not child pornography.’’ Well, the Child PROTECT Act 

took care of that. The Child PROTECT Act said virtual child pornography is child pornography. Any record—whether it’s a cartoon, 

whether it’s a drawing, whether it’s a computer-generated man sodomizing a 5-year-old boy—is against the law. Child pornography is 

against the law. 

So I’m glad to see that the Members of this Committee which 

supported the Child PROTECT Act—I mean, it was really the 

House of Representatives that carried the ball on the Child PROTECT Act. The version that you passed on the House side was so 

far superior to the Senate side that we had to have a 3-hour conference to work it out so that the Senate would come to the agreement that the House side, the one that many of you Members sitting right here, particularly Congresswoman Jackson Lee, supported, that was allowing background checks of everybody who 

works at Boys and Girls Clubs. The Boys and Girls Club wanted 

that. They wanted to know that nobody, no volunteer or anybody 

there working with children, was a convicted child molester. ICE 

has helped them with that, and the National Center. 

We reversed that decision on virtual child pornography. I mean, 

come on. You look at a screen; it looks like a real man sodomizing 

a little girl. It gives you the creeps. It breaks your heart; makes 

you cry; makes you mad; makes you angry. That was taken care 

of. 

The Child PROTECT Act that you supported so well mandated 

Code Adam in every Federal building. If a child is missing in a 

Federal building, Code Adam is activated immediately. The doors 

are shut, the security in that Federal building, that courthouse, 

whatever it is, looks for that child. Who’s implemented that ogram? 

You passed that wonderful legislation, but you forgot to tell who to 

implement it and to teach the Federal officers—for example, the 

Capitol Hill cops. You know who does it? The ICE guys. The ICE 

guys said, ‘‘We’ll take that responsibility. We’ll go in every Federal 

building and tell them how to do a Code Adam.’’ Code Adam’s 

saved kids lives. It’s caught people that were in the act of kidnapping children. It was started by Wal-Mart, and it was named after 

my son. What an honor. 

But, you know, that’s a long answer to your question. But you 

up here, through that Child PROTECT Act, took care of a lot of 

those concerns. It wasn’t just the Amber Alert, that has already 

saved 107 kids’ lives, that was mandated. It took us 6 years to get 

that piece of legislation passed. I don’t want to remind the Members here about it. I’m talking to the SWAT team for kids right 

here. But I know it took 6 years to get the Amber Alert passed as 

a national piece of legislation. Broke my heart for 6 years. 

But the Child PROTECT Act is a wonderful piece of legislation 

that the Members here participated in, and gave people, the men 

24

and women at ICE, the wherewithal to do the things that should 

have been done for 20 years. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Very good. The Chair now recognizes the 

gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson Lee, for questions. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you very much. Mr. Walsh, let me just 

say that our schedules up here in Washington sometimes don’t lend 

themselves to the graciousness that we should exhibit; and that is 

to be at every Committee hearing. As we speak, a Homeland Security Committee hearing is going on. And I happen to serve on that 

Committee, and I believe some of our Members have had to depart 

for that reason. But I’m going to be the school teacher, and assign 

everyone the responsibility of reading line by line the transcript 

that this fine gentleman is doing. So Mr. Chairman, I want you to 

hand that transcript out. 

The reason why I’m saying that is the words that are in this 

room tonight—or this morning, excuse me—really need to be broadcast or to be pronounced around our esteemed body, but also nationally. And that is this emphasis on the importance of protecting 

our children. And I will say that, without any indictment of anyone, it’s been a hard road to get that to be an interesting topic. 

And as I have looked at human trafficking with young girls in 

Bangladesh; as I have indicated to you without any shame, because 

I’m not broad-brushing the continent of Africa, but when we’ve 

gone there to look at questions of HIV/AIDS, and we’ve heard the 

stories of older men taking young girls as young as under ten because of something about purification and virginity and issues of 

that kind that would probably give us chills, but it happens; it is 

imperative that we use this opportunity, or many opportunities, to 

speak to what is happening to our children. 

We can go through a long list of poverty and not having breakfasts and lunches, but one thing about this kind of abuse: It ruins 

a child. If it doesn’t take their life, it certainly can contribute to 

a drastic altering of their life into adulthood. And so I want to 

thank both Mr. Garcia and Mr. Walsh. 

And let me just sort of explain, Mr. Garcia, two questions I want 

to pose to you, and let you understand where I’m going when John 

Walsh so aptly commented on my concern about the broad brush. 

And I’ll just focus on one aspect of it, and you can share your 

thoughts with me and then let us see how we can help you. 

The question of the definition of sexual abuse of a minor, the 

question I raise, and I think you’re familiar with it, that some cultures marry early or have the need to—I had a situation in my 

community, and it was individuals from Mexico. And the gentleman, I guess, was about 19 and intending—in fact, they have 

married. Let me just say that they have married. And he was not 

a citizen, and so he was, if you will, arrested, or taken under criminal proceedings, for the relationship he had with a young person 

under 15. 

My question would be to you, do you take into consideration any 

of those circumstances when it is a cultural acquiescence by family 

members; they’re ultimately marrying? I think you are aware of 

some of the cultural ceremonies that go on when someone is 15, 

etcetera; and whether or not that comes to your attention. 

25

Let me give you these other questions, so you can answer it. 

What might be helpful today as well—and I’m interested in how we 

can emphasize or improve the database, collecting of data—are 

your databases overloaded? Are you able to keep up with the increasing securing of data? And in the budget request for 2005, has 

Homeland Security provided extra requests for the ICE functions? 

And if not, let’s see how we can help you to do that, if you don’t 

have the necessary resources. 

The other point that I wanted to ask of you is this whole question of our foreign governments. Again, that goes to the misunderstanding of how children can be used internationally. Are we getting the cooperation that we need amongst our foreign governments? And if not, give us advice and instruction how we can begin 

to press the State Department to not only look at human trafficking, but these enormous crises that we’re dealing with the 

abuse of children. 

Mr. Garcia, I’d appreciate it. And I’m going to pose some questions to Mr. Walsh, but I’d appreciate your response. 

Mr. GARCIA. Thank you, Congresswoman. And I’ll begin where 

you did, in the definition of sexual abuse of a minor under the immigration law. Our approach——

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And that particular incident was under local 

criminal law, so you were not involved. But you understand what 

I’m saying. 

Mr. GARCIA. And I may have heard of that case, or I’ve heard of 

similar cases, certainly. What I can tell you is that we look at each 

case on a case-by-case basis. There were some cases that actually 

came to my attention early on in the Predator initiative, where 

looking at what the actual charges were or had been and the fact 

pattern, the status of the individual, say a legal permanent resident, we did look at those cases and make decisions in terms of detention, etcetera, and how we proceeded. And we continue to do 

that. And actually, we’ve sent out some guidance on that issue, because I do think it’s important. Each case has to be treated separately. 

By the same token, where we’ve seen heinous criminals who 

have managed to obtain bail and other relief in the immigration 

proceedings, we’ve appealed and we’ve been very aggressive in 

seeking remedy on that front, as well. So on a case-by-case basis, 

we look at what was the decision here and what’s the proper way 

to proceed. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And my question, if I might, is a one-on-one 

relationship where the people ultimately marry, but they were 

caught up in that kind of misunderstanding. 

Mr. GARCIA. And certainly, again, that would be a factor we 

would look at. And we would also look at what’s the status of the 

individual, what’s the fact pattern involved in the underlying 

charge or course of conduct that led to whatever the charges were 

that we’ve based our action upon. And we’ll take a look at that. 

And we have actually sent out guidance on that front. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you. 

Mr. GARCIA. In terms of our data systems and the overload: Really, a department-wide issue, obviously. For us at ICE, we’ve taken 

at least four different legacy systems and tried to merge them into 

26

one law enforcement agency. And as I’ve discussed with the Chairman, those types of IT and administrative issues are really the 

most serious challenges we face as an agency. 

We have a short-term solution, in terms of a method to access 

all our systems so that the person sitting at the desk can get into 

every system we have and make sure the checks are run. And we 

have a long-term plan for a new law enforcement platform to be 

serviced across the department enforcement agencies. 

We have asked for additional resources in the President’s 2005 

budget, $186 million in enhancements, including money for an institutional removal program, fugitive operations, detention bed 

space, legal backlog elimination, things that will support the Predator and other priority programs. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And the databases, as well? 

Mr. GARCIA. And will support our work towards creating this 

database. And again, that’s a long-term project, Congresswoman, 

as I know your work in the past——

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Yes. 

Mr. GARCIA. You’re well aware of the need for long-term planning on that front so we get it right. 

In terms of foreign government cooperation: critical to the success of our mission. We recently were given operational control over 

former Customs and INS assets overseas. We have seen cooperation in foreign governments. The Chairman mentioned the case involving Mexico. We saw tremendous cooperation from the Mexican 

government. In fact, the initial lead for that case came from the 

Mexican authorities. We took enforcement action in the New York 

area; sent back leads we developed. They took enforcement action 

on the—in their jurisdiction. 

We have partnership there. We need to move forward in many 

cases. And I’m sure you’re aware, Congresswoman, it involves 

training and education, as Mr. Walsh pointed out, on the reach of 

our law. People don’t understand. The pedophiles that go overseas 

don’t understand, foreign governments don’t understand, the incredibly powerful tools Mr. Walsh mentioned that you have given 

us to work with; the fact that we can get at these predators, these 

pedophiles, who think they can cross our borders, go overseas, pick 

on 7-year-olds in Thailand with impunity, with immunity. And they 

can’t. 

And we’ve sent that message in our four first cases under the 

PROTECT Act. We’ve worked very closely with authorities in 

Bangkok, Cambodia which has such a tremendous problem in this 

area. We’re looking to sign some formal agreements on that front. 

And I have found that the hurdle there is to make sure we get 

out—we get the message out about what we can do, what we can 

provide; and then educate and go step by step with those local authorities to help them work with us to remove those predators from 

their streets; and bring them back here, and that’s the case of the 

PROTECT Act, and make sure they’re prosecuted. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I thank you very much. That is an excellent 

segue, if I might, to Mr. Walsh. You’ve certainly given me—let me 

just say two things. One, I’d like to help you with the database, to 

specifically look to see if the funding is finite enough to address 

27

your needs there. So Mr. Chairman, I’d like to work with you as 

we look at the appropriations situation. I’d appreciate it very much. 

The other thing I would ask, and if the Chairman would indulge 

me—I’m looking at the clock. If you would just indulge me for a 

moment to get a question in to Mr. Walsh. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Without objection. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I thank you very much. The other point that 

I would raise, Mr. Chairman, as I talk to the Committee as well, 

that I think we need to have a hearing with members of the State 

Department, the appropriate officials in the State Department. We 

might secure some of the international organizations, relief organizations, children’s organizations, UNICEF. I believe that we’ve got 

to elevate this issue on an international level. 

And then Mr. Garcia has been very kind by suggesting that he’s 

getting cooperation, probably working with officials. I appreciate it. 

I’m not sure if it has reached the most appropriate high levels, and 

whether it’s reached the levels of the State Department. 

And with that in mind, that’s why I’m leading to Mr. Walsh. And 

I do want to tell him, isn’t it wonderful to be able to give, if you 

will, energy to an organization like the National Center that gets 

called—civilians call the National Center. 

Mr. WALSH. Absolutely. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I’ve called the National Center on issues of 

lost children and exploited children; ‘‘Can you help me?’’ And it’s 

almost like the civil rights movement for children; that people feel 

their rights have been deprived, they get on the phone and call the 

agency that they think will do so. So let me just thank you very 

much for the leadership that generated that kind of entity. 

But let me ask you this. How can we—one, what do you think 

of this idea of trying to establish more of a presence internationally, as we hear all these stories? And two, you gave a sort of 

frightening anecdotal story—and this is not a condemnation of law 

enforcement—of how busy they are, how small law enforcement is 

from the rural hamlets to big cities, how overloaded they are. And 

now they are now the homeland security first responders. 

This whole idea of a national public campaign and how can Congress interface with that to put this—at least to say to them, 

‘‘Here’s what’s available.’’ We’re up here passing laws, from the 

PROTECT Act, to Adam’s Law, to Megan’s Law, to many others 

that we’ve been able to do. 

And thank you for your commentary on the DNA because in particular, not only for sexual offenders, but we’re going to refine it 

to have it for child predators; so they could go quickly to it and 

know that these are individuals that prey right on it. And I’m looking out the side of my eye on my Chairman, and I’m going to be 

parroting him to go to the Chairman for us to have hearings on 

that along with the Crime Subcommittee. 

But Mr. Walsh, tell me what you think about the fact that we 

need to do the international work; but also, what kind of campaign? Because, you know, we can provide funding to suggest that 

we have a national campaign. I mean, that can be an earmark, or 

it can be out of a particular department, if it is so crucial to have 

it. And your thoughts about that would be appreciated. 

28

Mr. WALSH. Absolutely. And I love it when you said you’re going 

to be the school teacher here. And I was only kidding about the 

lunches. I know they’re doing their jobs. But for you to be the 

school teacher and make sure that they know what went on at this 

hearing today is wonderful. I really think so. Because, you know, 

they’re just as over-burdened as everybody else is. 

I love the analogy that it’s almost a civil rights movement for 

children. I’ve seen more movement in this last year by Congress on 

both sides of the aisle for children, meaningful legislation and 

money, than I’ve seen in 20 years. It’s really encouraging. But you 

know, I think Mike Garcia is pretty humble, and I think ICE is, 

when they come and say, ‘‘Well, our database is overloaded. We 

need $186 million to get ICE up to snuff and exchange information,’’ like your wonderful bill about the database. 

I mean, we all like to see the pictures on the other side of Mars, 

okay? But I live in Florida, where NASA is headquartered. And 

when you write those checks for billions of dollars to send those 

stupid little things up to Mars, it’s wonderful; it’s great; but you 

know what? If we can’t get $186 million for these guys to exchange 

information to hunt down a guy that’s got a rap sheet 27 pages 

long and should be out of the country or should be in jail, I mean, 

it’s for you, it’s tip money, or walking-around money. 

International cooperation: I don’t see it. I mean, Mike and ICE 

have tried to initiated it. During President Clinton’s two terms, I 

met with him several times saying, ‘‘Why don’t we have an extradition treaty with Mexico?’’ We’ve lent them billions of dollars, and 

saved them when the peso was devalued, and saved that country’s 

economy. And they wouldn’t sign an extradition treaty. I had nine ‘‘America’s Most Wanted’’ fugitives and I knew exactly where they 

were in Mexico. A guy who raped and murdered a 9-year-old girl 

in front of her mother, an illegal Mexican national, and blinded the 

mother. And I knew exactly where he was. His father was the chief 

of police of a small town down in Mexico, and he was being protected by his father. And Mexico has only just started. I mean, 

here’s a country we saved, that we saved their economy, and they 

won’t sign an extradition treaty to send back our fugitives, particularly our child sexual predators. 

We’re just starting to make some leeway in Thailand. Where you 

talked about the cultural differences in Africa, you know, where it’s 

a symbol of virility and long life to rob an 11-year-old, 10-year-old 

girl of her virginity, well, in Thailand, you can buy a little girl. Eric 

Rosser bought a 9-year-old girl from her immigrant peasant family, 

because they were broke and starving, and he made a video of himself sodomizing and raping her to sell on the Internet. 

Costa Rica, you go down there tomorrow. I’ve sent crews down 

there four or five times. You want to have sex with a little boy? 

You don’t have to talk to somebody. They’re on the street. Their little prostitutes are out there hustling. 

That dentist that I talked about, he went down there on 

pedophile tours. There are tours from Germany and from the 

United States, where pedophiles get together and go to Thailand 

and Costa Rica to have sex with kids, because they know it’s not 

illegal in that country, that nobody’s going to do it. It took us forever to get an indictment against this dentist down in Costa Rica. 

29

It was the threat that I would put Costa Rica as a country allowing 

this on ‘‘America’s Most Wanted’’ every week for a year until they 

did something about it to get this guy arrested. And they let him 

bond out with a $1,000 bond. He destroyed the lives, as you so 

aptly put—he destroyed the lives of these little people. They 

thought it was funny. But finally, we nailed him. Finally, when he 

came back here, the message sent by the Child PROTECT Act was, 

‘‘So what, if you didn’t do it here? You did it in Costa Rica, and 

we know about it. And you’re going to pay. You’re going to pay 

under our laws.’’ So I would like to see the State Department saddle up. I would 

like to see Congress say: Okay, we send relief and aid to many of 

these countries, and they deserve it. We are a wonderful, wonderful 

country. We reach out. Our generosity is worldwide. Why not put 

a little pressure on them? Why not say, ‘‘Hey, you’re harboring this. 

You’re harboring this behavior. You’re allowing this to go on. 

You’re not cooperating with us. You’re not sending these creeps 

back. You’re sending a loud message that anybody can run and 

hide, anybody can do what they want to an American child and 

then they can hide in this country, or an American can come here 

and exploit a child.’’ So I love your analogy about, hey, we’re reaching out to protect 

children worldwide. Absolutely. So you know, Mike is being very 

nice about saying we’ve opened the door with Mexico, and all that 

type of stuff. You know, my attitude is, if we’re going to give them 

money, let them pony-up. Let them step up to the bar. Let’s ask 

them some hard questions. Let’s put some strings to that relief. 

Let’s put some strings attached to it and say, ‘‘Come on, this goes 

on in your country.’’ Get Mexico to sign that extradition treaty. We saved that country. I have fugitives down there now. ‘‘Oh, we don’t believe in the 

death penalty. We can’t send them back. We don’t want to.’’ Come 

on. What the hell kind of message is this? 

The hobo serial killer, perfect example: Ramirez. He was in and 

out of Immigration’s hands ten times. While he committed a murder and was put on the FBI’s Top Ten, he was in an immigration 

jail in Dallas, Texas, for crossing the border illegally; because none 

of those agencies even exchange information. The FBI is over-burdened. They do a great job. Their Innocent Images program is wonderful. They give us guys on ‘‘America’s Most Wanted’’—I work 

closely with them. 

But these people know how to beat the system. They know how 

to beat the system. Ramirez, every time it got close to catching 

him, he hopped back across that border. He’d been in and out of 

American jails 17 times, over 20 years. He’d been convicted of 

crimes against Americans. He knew how to beat the system by 

murdering someone close to a train. He jumped on that train. He 

didn’t take a bus; he didn’t take a plane. He hightailed it back to 

Mexico. Before the sheriff ever investigated the murder, he was 

across the border. We ignored that. We ignored that. That man 

killed eight Americans. Eight Americans. 

He wasn’t in a system anywhere. There wasn’t any record of his 

crimes. It was only till the TV show started to focus in on him and 

put those murders together, did we realize that we had an illegal 

30

alien, Mexican national, jumping back and forth at will, in custody 

and out of custody, while he was committing the murders. It was 

disgusting. He killed eight Americans. 

Give him [Secretary Garcia] the money. He’ll track them down. 

He’ll find out what’s going on when they get out of jail. Whoever 

tracked Resendez Ramirez? Nobody. We let him out of jail to kill 

eight Americans. What the hell is that? We can get a man on the 

moon; we can put these little lunar modules on Mars and send 

back these pictures; but we can’t track a guy that’s been in and out 

of 17 prisons, killed eight people? It’s disgusting. Stupid. It’s unacceptable. Especially if you’re one of the surviving members of those 

families, of those victims’ families, who ask the same question: 

What in the hell was this guy doing in the country? And what in 

the hell was he doing going back and forth across the border? And 

why, when Immigration had him, did they let him out of that jail 

after 4 days, when he was on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted? What 

kind of exchange of information is that? 

He’s [Secretary Garcia] trying to—he’s trying to do something 

about that. Give him the ability. Give him the money. You guys 

give Homeland Security the money. I love to look at those pictures 

from Mars, but I hate to put guys like Resendez Ramirez on 

‘‘America’s Most Wanted.’’ And that’s just like in the Carli Brucia case. I asked one thing 

about the murder of that little girl: Why was that guy out on the 

streets? It’s my home State. He’d been arrested 13 times; he was 

convicted of 13 felonies. His probation officer went in to a judge in 

Sarasota and said, ‘‘This low-life needs to be back in jail. He’s 

failed the drug test. I ordered a drug test. He’s tested positive for 

heroin and cocaine. He’s been a ‘Peeping Tom.’ He beat a woman 

near to death with a helmet. Put him back in, Your Honor.’’ And 

the judge had the ability to arbitrarily say, ‘‘Our jails are too full. 

Let him out.’’ Then what did he do 2 months later? He killed Carli 

Brucia. His butt should have been in jail. 

Parole? He was on parole. Parole is a privilege. He revoked that 

privilege. What kind of message do we send, the State of Florida? 

Governor Bush and I, the Attorney General, and all kinds of people 

here in Washington are going to try to change that law in Florida 

and put those repeat offenders back. They shouldn’t be on the 

streets. But don’t tell Carli Brucia’s mother that, or tell Carli 

Brucia’s father. They’ll be angry at the government for the rest of 

their lives in the State of Florida, for letting that guy walk around. 

They’d go in there and pound that judge today, if they could. 

They ask good questions. That’s what he wants to do: get that 

database, coordinate it. These guys walk out of jail; they go like 

this [gestures], ‘‘The hell with you, America. I’m going to get on a 

bus, I’m going to get on a train, and I’m going to go to another 

State. I’m going to continue preying upon children.’’ Because nobody in the past has met them at the jailhouse door and said, 

‘‘Your butt is out of here. You’re going back. The condition of your 

parole and probation is for you to leave this country and never 

come back in. And we’re going to make sure that if you ever try 

to get in again, you come across the borders through Immigration 

or Customs; it’ll come right up when you show your illegal ID. Or 

if you come across those borders illegally, we’re going to put you 

31

in jail for the rest of your life.’’ It’s a nice message to send to these 

other countries. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. It sure is. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you. Thank you very much for your indulgence. Thank you, Mr. Walsh. 

Mr. WALSH. Oh, thank you for having these hearings. God bless 

you. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Arizona. 

Mr. FLAKE. Thank the Chairman, and thank the witnesses. It’s 

been extremely enlightening. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Mr. 

Garcia several months ago when we launched ICE Storm in Phoenix. And we’ve already seen the effects of that. A couple of drop 

houses were recently raided, a few hundred people in a house. 

Some of them had been there for 3 days, some without food and 

water. Just a horrible, horrible situation. We have a lot of need, obviously, in Arizona for as many resources as we can muster. And 

I appreciate the work of Mr. Walsh; been a fan for a long time. 

Mr. WALSH. Thank you. 

Mr. FLAKE. And you’ve done a lot of good work. 

Mr. Garcia, about 2 years ago, ABC Channel 15 ran a series of 

stories on sex tourists in Mexico. And I think it—I came back here 

with the tapes of those series and gave them to some colleagues. 

And it was just—I went into the studio and watched some of those 

tapes. It was basically Americans, Arizonans, going down to Acapulco and Mazatlan, and just basically going with one purpose in 

mind: sex tourism. And it was just unbelievable how callous they 

were, and how they just flouted it. And they had gone down there 

to investigate it with hidden cameras, and it was just unbelievable. 

It just shook everybody who watched it to the core. 

And I think it provided a lot of fodder for those who are pushing 

for new laws and for new resources to actually go at this. And I 

just want to say publicly that they did a good job on this and they 

really helped spur some action. 

But with operation—or you mentioned that with Mexico they 

now have a task force to deal with sex tourism. Mr. Garcia, can you 

expand on that? How are they cooperating? And has it been good 

cooperation? We could use a lot better cooperation in Mexico in a 

number of areas, like extradition. How have they been on this 

issue? 

Mr. GARCIA. I agree, Congressman, and with Mr. Walsh. Obviously, there’s always a tremendous amount of work that needs to 

be done. We have seen—and I think Mr. Walsh pointed it out, as 

well—on the local level with the officers we work with, that work 

regularly with our agents overseas, tremendous cooperation in this 

area, in terms of providing us information that leads to these 

houses in the United States, or providing information on the sex 

tourists that you mentioned that think they can cross the border 

and commit these crimes without any repercussions. 

There is work that needs to be done. And you can see, Congressman, I—my experience has been that sometimes in one jurisdiction 

and a locality, you’ll get very good cooperation. You may move 50 

miles down the road and, for one reason or another, you’re not seeVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:14 May 21, 2004 Jkt 089266 PO 00000 Frm 00035 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 G:\WORK\IMMIG\030404\92347.000 HJUD1 PsN: 92347
32

ing the willingness to work with us, where people know that this 

activity is going on. 

And we need to make sure we’re doing everything we can, particularly now that since January we have operational control of the 

overseas offices investigating this activity; that we’re doing everything we can to change that; to continue where we have the success, but to also start to look at the problems that you have highlighted here today in terms of the need to do more. And we recognize that. 

Mr. FLAKE. Thank you. Mr. Walsh, we’ve seen in Arizona, and 

I think across the country, the kind of a shift from drug smuggling 

to human smuggling. The profits are just as great, or greater. The 

sentences are usually lesser. And that’s part of the reason for that. 

Can you talk about that? 

Are we seeing the shift that we need to focus on the human 

smuggling? Because with it comes the sex issues, and everything 

else. Can you comment on that? Do we need harsher sentences in 

that regard, to drive people out of that business, as well? 

Mr. WALSH. Well, I absolutely agree. I went down into your State 

on the Tucson border there, and rode with ICE. That’s what I was 

talking about. I rode with the Border Patrol on their pintos, on 

their horses, their paints. I rode in their Black Hawks. I worked 

with them down there. And the problem is human smuggling. 

Drugs are coming across, yes. They always will, and Mexico will 

always be a conduit. And the Mexicans are right: As long as the 

appetite is here in the United States, they’ll be in that business. 

They’ll provide it. But much more lucrative has become the smuggling of humans. With no regard whatsoever, they’ll charge someone $1,500; pack them in a truck. You’ve all seen the pictures in 

the newspaper. They’ll bail out of that truck, and leave ten or 12 

or 15 or 20 people to suffocate to death, or die on the border. 

And what they also do is, they’ll know the name of that person. 

And when that person gets into the United States successfully and 

starts working as an illegal immigrant, maybe as a dishwasher or 

a migrant worker, they will kidnap a member of their family or a 

child in Mexico, and hold that child for ransom, and demand five, 

six, seven, ten, 15, 20 thousand dollars for that illegal alien that’s 

working here at minimum wage. It’s unbelievable, the level of extortion and exploitation in human smuggling. 

And you’re absolutely right: The penalties for a drug smuggler 

are twice, three, four times what they are for a human smuggler. 

And they know. They bail out. They run back. They bring them in, 

and they make the money; get the money whether the person gets 

across the border or not. They get their money up front. They don’t 

care if they get them alive or dead. 

And, yes, these guys are down there. They sit on those horses all 

night long. It’s amazing. People are shooting, smugglers are shooting, guns are going off, trucks are going. It’s chaos. I mean, I don’t 

know how they do it. They should be getting about, you know, what 

an athlete gets, $5 million a year, for sitting in there in the dark 

while guns are going off, etcetera. 

And then, you see these people. And the smuggler, when they do 

catch them, he bonds out; he runs back to Mexico. It’s like a slap 

on the wrist. It’s a joke. You’re damn right. Make it so difficult. 

33

Send that message. When ICE arrests one of these guys on the border, let’s keep him here. Let’s put him in jail for 20 years. He’s 

going to make that call back to Mexico and say, ‘‘Hey, hombre, 

don’t do it any more. It’s not worth it. I’m here in a Federal prison 

for 25 years. Don’t do it any more.’’ Mr. FLAKE. Right. 

Mr. WALSH. You’re right. You hit it right on the nose. But all 

they can do is arrest them; can’t keep them in jail. It’s up to you 

guys. You pass that Federal law; make it stiff; make it tough for 

a human smuggler. Look at the misery. A drug smuggler is one 

thing; but a smuggler of humans, that’s a disgusting, despicable 

person, who couldn’t care whether they live or die. 

And when they abandon them down on the border and they go 

back, and these people die, I think we should charge them with 

homicide. They brought these people, and left them there to freeze 

to death, or to die of dehydration or whatever. Get that extradition 

treaty. Bring them back; charge them with homicide and try them. 

Send a message. Send that message. 

Mr. FLAKE. Thank you. Mr. Garcia, most of us have gone to the 

border. I rode with Secretary Ridge in December along the border. 

And the notion that we’re going to stop all traffic coming over the 

border, to me, is just pretty far-fetched, unless we have some legal, 

orderly process for those who are simply coming for economic reasons to work to do so. Myself, Senator McCain, and Congressman 

Kolbe, as you know, have proffered a bill to do that. 

Do you see the need for a comprehensive solution; be it this one 

or another one? Because even if you did seal the border, even if we 

could, 40 percent of those who are here illegally first entered the 

country legally. So we need to deal with the reality that there are 

people here that are going to stay here, that we’re not going to deport, and that we need to deal with and realize—particularly children, who came here as children—that they consider themselves as 

American as American, and rightly so. 

What is your feeling overall? I know this isn’t the purpose of this 

hearing, but I just had a meeting outside with a number of people 

who have come and it’s on my mind. 

Mr. GARCIA. Certainly, Congressman. As you mentioned, the 

President has come out with his statement regarding the guest 

worker program. Congress—yourself—has proposed certain legislation or mechanisms for doing what you were suggesting. 

What I feel should be our contribution at ICE to that process is 

to watch the proceedings and how Congress and the President 

structure that mechanism, and to input our enforcement expertise 

to ensure that the group that it is decided should have this relief— and you mentioned some of those people—that that’s getting to the 

right group; that we don’t see the fraud and abuse that we’ve seen 

in the past. I think that’s very important. And I think we can bring 

some expertise to the table and some help in that area, to make 

sure that whatever path is chosen by those involved gets to the 

right folks. 

I have been asked out to the border. We did meet out in Phoenix. 

Tremendous issues in the Arizona smuggling corridor. ICE went 

out primarily as a response to the incredible spike in violence in 

the Phoenix metropolitan area. Since we’ve been out there, I’m 

34

happy to report that we saw a 30 percent reduction rate in murders in Phoenix in the last part of 2003, which the Phoenix PD, 

etcetera, are attributing to ICE Storm and our work. ICE Storm 

was obviously ini cooperation with the local enforcement officials. 

So far that has been a tremendous success. 

But as you point out, we’re continuing to find drop houses, places 

where this human cargo, essentially, is being held in really incredibly horrific conditions. I have pointed out the threat to children. 

We saw a child die in the back of a tractor trailer in Victoria, Texas 

last year, suffocate. Those smugglers also had a 3-year-old boy that 

they wanted to ransom out, that ICE did as an undercover; rescued 

the boy, and arrested the kidnapper/smugglers. 

We’ve seen children abandoned in the desert, and left to die. And 

it really is an issue of protecting these children that are brought 

over, exploited on the way over. And it’s something, as you’ve 

pointed out, we really need to hit hard. And there are some terrific 

penalties in place where we’ve had victims who have been killed, 

like in the Victoria case; but we really need to do more in that 

area. 

Mr. FLAKE. Thank you. And I thank the Chairman. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Thank the gentleman. The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Iowa, Mr. King. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’d point out initially I do 

represent Denison, Iowa, where in October 2002, the decomposed 

bodies of 11 suspected illegal aliens were discovered in a railroad 

car. The deceased had left Mexico in June. They were extremely 

overheated in the rail car, and dehydration led to their deaths. 

That’s something that impacts our local community. It impacts the 

attitude and the political position, really, on immigration in my district, and all the way down to the border and back. 

Abd you raised the issue, Mr. Walsh, of the extradition treaty. 

And I agree with you: Marketing in human beings and trafficking 

in human beings should be severely punished. But we’re not able 

to extradite people when it exceeds the penalty level of the Mexicans. And I’m one of those people that believes that we ought to 

take a good look at all of our agreements with a country that would 

interfere with how we enforce our laws in this country. And so I 

appreciate that testimony, and both your testimony. 

I’d direct my question to Mr. Garcia. And that is, Mr. Garcia, 

under Operation Predator, ICE must have arrested several aliens 

who were convicted of their offenses over the past, say, several 

years. What responses has the agency received from the immigration judges and the Board of Immigration Appeals when it attempts to detain and remove those aliens? 

Mr. GARCIA. Thank you, Congressman. Very good question; and 

the answer is, really, you look case by case. Under certain legislation, there is mandatory detention for aggravated felons. Many of 

those we arrest, obviously, under Operation Predator fall within 

that mandatory detention provision. 

Unfortunately, we have seen cases where heinous individuals 

convicted of really atrocious crimes have been bailed at a level. And 

we’ve been very aggressive in appealing those decisions, or staying 

those decisions, and asking for reconsideration in those cases. 

35

Overall, I’ve said there has been adherence to the mandatory detention requirements, and a recognition of the seriousness of these 

crimes and the history of these individuals we bring before the IJs 

in immigration court. But we have had some instances where we’ve 

had—it’s been necessary for us to take additional action to get a 

remedy that we believe should have been initially forwarded to us. 

Mr. KING. So if I heard that correctly, we have judges who are 

ignoring the mandatory retention? 

Mr. GARCIA. We have seen that. I will be honest. We have seen 

cases where those we believed were subject to mandatory detention 

provisions under the statute were bailed. 

As I’m sure you’re well aware, there was some question over the 

constitutionality of that particular legislation for some time. That 

was resolved last year in the DeMar v. Kim case that the Supreme 

Court decided. And it is now clear that that provision is constitutional. And we are being very aggressive in seeing that it’s enforced. 

Mr. KING. I think it’s interesting that a judge can sit on an individual case and disregard a statute by their judgment on the constitutionality of that statute. And I’ll be looking for those judges 

who do ignore the statute. Thank you, Mr. Garcia. And thank you, 

Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. WALSH. Thank you. You make a good point, Congressman. 

Thank you. It’s mind-boggling when a judge doesn’t adhere to Federal law, and decides to arbitrarily let somebody bond out that he 

knows in his heart is going to run across that border and we’re 

never going to see him again. But good point, great point. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. I thank the gentleman. And Mr. Walsh, your 

point is an excellent one that I will not prolong much further. But 

I will not speak for Mr. Garcia or any of his employees, but I can 

tell you on numerous occasions the Chair has heard from various 

law enforcement entities that they are really looking at what a 

judge will do. And they are asking themselves, ‘‘Is this worth my 

time, knowing what this judge, or knowing what judges in general 

will do in this particular case?’’

Mr. WALSH. Absolutely. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. And so many times we may fault law enforcement with not getting their job done, when in fact they are trying 

in their best ability to get their job done. Only in that execution 

of their job, they’re just taking into account reality of the judicial 

system as it is today. 

Mr. WALSH. It’s—you make such an important comment. I mean, 

again, in the Carli Brucia case, how do you think that probation 

officer and the detective who arrested that guy that killed Carli 

Brucia felt, when they went in and said, ‘‘Your Honor, he’s violated 

parole. He’s a dangerous individual. Put him back in jail.’’ Now, 

probation officers have an average of 75 cases. They don’t have 

time to go in and beg a judge to put somebody in. When you take 

the time to go in, and you show them the file, and you bring the 

cop that arrested him, and you bring everybody else, and you say, 

‘‘Look, this scumbag belongs in jail,’’ and the judge says, ‘‘Ah, he 

just—you know, maybe he’ll get some help. He’s a druggie,’’ and 

they go, ‘‘No.’’ How do you think they feel? They’re going to go back 

and say, ‘‘This judge is killing me. I’m going to do something else. 

36

I’m going to work on a different case. I’m not going to go in there. 

I’m not going to do it.’’ You’re absolutely right. It’s disheartening. You’re trying to do 

your job. You’re underpaid; you’re overworked; you’re stressed out. 

And you go in there, and a judge—pompous people that they can 

be, and wonderful that they can be—makes an arbitrary decision 

and goes out—that goes outside the law. Of course, yes, it’s disheartening. I see cops that are saying all the time, ‘‘Not going to 

work that case. I can’t stand that judge.’’ And you know, we’ve dealt with that in the Child PROTECT Act, 

about Federal judges going outside the guidelines, you know, the 

Federal mandates and the Federal guidelines. And you know, I 

don’t know, where does this disrespect come from? You know, you 

pass a Federal law. I mean, I don’t—I adhere to the guidelines that 

are set in my life by you on the Federal level: Pay your taxes; do 

this and that. I wouldn’t dare go outside those. And I don’t know 

how a judge gets off doing it. 

So in a lot of child protection—I mean child exploitation cases in 

the past, we’ve seen judges go outside those guidelines. Thank God, 

the Child PROTECT Act made it mandatory life without possibility 

of parole for a two-time offender. But most of the cases of exploitation of children, about 90 percent of them, are tried on the State 

and local level. So it really is a State problem. 

But it’s really—it’s really unnerving and really disappointing, especially for these guys that are out on those streets all night in the 

ICE, you know, risking their lives. You know, when a judge goes, 

‘‘Ah, let the guy bond out,’’ that judge knows, so does the cop that 

arrested him, so does that ICE agent, that that guy is going to 

walk across that border and say, ‘‘The hell with you. I’m going to 

go down and, you know, I’m going to party down in Cabo San 

Lucas’’; make a mockery of the criminal justice system in America. 

I still, I just can’t—it’s mind-boggling that we’ve lent Mexico— and they’ve been a great neighbor—billions of dollars to save their 

economy, and they won’t sign an extradition treaty. I can’t make 

them. If it was up to me, I’d go down there tomorrow and take care 

of it; but it’s up to you. It’s up to you guys, men and women here, 

sitting right up here. It’s up to you to go—and the President can’t 

do it, and Colin Powell can’t do it. Nobody can do it except you 

guys. You can do it. You can say, ‘‘You want to keep the relationships? You want the free trade zones? You want to be our good 

neighbor? Well, send those dirtbags back, and let us go down and 

get your criminals, too, and try them under American law.’’

It’s a joke. I’ve been in Mexico nine million times. They laugh at 

us. It’s a joke. See guys walking around; they’ve got 15 warrants 

on them in the United States, and they’re walking around in public. It’s degrading and humiliating. It’s stupid. Anyway, change it. 

Don’t give them any more money until they sign that extradition 

treaty. 

Lots of countries that we deal with that don’t take our money, 

that we haven’t bailed them out, we haven’t saved their economy, 

readily sign the extradition treaties and work with us on all kinds 

of issues. We don’t give them any money. 

I mean, I don’t know, President Clinton and I had 52 meetings 

about this. I said, ‘‘You know, this is a win-win-win for you. Force 

37

them to sign that treaty when you give them that NAFTA money.’’ He said, ‘‘I can’t do it. It’s got to be mandated by Congress.’’ I don’t 

know. Passed the buck. 

But anyway, you bring up a good point. Congressman King, 

you’re right there. And you know, Mr. Flake, he’s sitting on the 

border. He knows these guys hop across. Look at that—I mean, Arizona is in big trouble. I’ve been to Tucson and Phoenix. Those used 

to be cities where retirees would go to play golf. They used to be 

nice places to live. It’s cowboy land. It’s the ‘‘wild west.’’ It’s the ‘‘wild west,’’ because the guys know they can jump over and do all 

kinds of things and commit heinous, heinous crimes. These guys 

can arrest them. They can bond out, and they can go back, and you 

never see them again. It’s really a joke. 

But anyway, that’s what we’re here for today. God bless you. Do 

something about it. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Thank you very much, Mr. Walsh. Secretary 

Garcia, thank you for your presence and your testimony, and especially for the work that you and your folks are doing to solve this 

problem. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Chairman? Excuse me, Mr. Chairman. 

And isn’t the world small? I have a delegation. Mr. Chairman, 

would you yield just for 1 second? 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. The Chair recognizes the gentlelady. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I’m sorry. I wasn’t escaping. I have a delegation from Denmark, and they were listening, and so I had stepped 

away. I apologize. This is the ministry of homeland security. They 

were listening to you, Mr. Walsh, Mr. Garcia. 

And they were inspired to say—they came specifically to find out 

how they can secure their homeland, and they were listening; and 

to also deal with immigration issues. And they were impressed by 

our international discussion about working on this question of 

predators. 

So I just wanted you—you can—and I wanted the Chairman— you can walk out, sir. This is the minister of homeland security. 

But in any event, they were impressed, Mr. Chairman, by your 

Committee, and impressed by the Members here. And I just wanted to let you know that I had stepped aside just for that. 

Mr. WALSH. It’s wonderful they’re here and you recognize them. 

I think it’s great that they’re here. Because I’ve been to the Middle 

East; I’ve been to the Persian Gulf. It’s a global community now. 

The terrorists know that. There aren’t any borders any more. I’ve 

walked across the Afghanistan border back and forth a zillion 

times. You know, the terrorists that got into this country, that flew 

into the towers and into the Pentagon or in that plane that went 

down in Shanksville, that was so easy for them to get in this country. And they come all over the world. I’ve been all over the world 

chasing terrorists and fugitives. They know how to use the Internet. They know how to launder money. They know how to send 

money. 

I’m glad to see them here. And Homeland Security has taken the 

initiative, yes. And they have the mandate to make it safer here. 

But I agree with you, the mandate should be to our partners, like 

in Denmark. Let’s stop this territorial stuff, and let’s start exchanging information. 

38

One of the good things that Homeland Security and ICE do is 

they work with Interpol; which gives them a chance to hunt down 

fugitives worldwide. I’ve been for years before Committees saying, 

‘‘Come on, let’s use the resources of Interpol.’’

So it’s great that these people are here from Denmark because, 

I’ll tell you what: Terrorists, child predators, people who traffic in 

human beings and children, they know no borders. They don’t respect any borders. They go to the places where they get treated the 

easiest, like Mexico and Costa Rica and Thailand. They know how 

to evade people. They know how to evade prosecution. They know 

how to evade penalties. 

It’s great. It’s great to see these people here from Denmark, because members of Hamas, Hezbollah, al-Qaeda—I can name 

zillions of terrorists that I’ve been hunting for—they could be in 

Denmark tomorrow. They were in Germany, planning the attacks 

on the Trade Towers, in hotels in Germany. It doesn’t matter 

where you live any more. It’s a global community. And they’re always one step ahead of us. They always know what the laws are. 

They know what they’re doing. They’re always one step ahead of 

us. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And I thank you for indulging me. Let me just 

offer my appreciation to the Chairman; Mr. Garcia; Mr. Walsh, who 

comes from his sunny Florida. Whenever we call, he comes. 

And Mr. Walsh, you have provoked, I think, an action item. I 

don’t want to misspeak on what the Chairman and myself have 

agreed on, but I think you have prodded us to move on this as it 

relates internationally, and maybe involve some other Committees. 

And maybe we would advise that this would happen and you would 

grace us again with coming to appear on that hearing. 

Mr. WALSH. I’d be honored to. I’d be honored to. Your statement 

of saying that this is a civil rights issue for children, and getting 

the State Department off their butt: You’re right on target, Congresswoman. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you. 

Mr. WALSH. You’re right on target. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I thank you so very much, and our respect for 

you and your loss. 

Mr. Garcia, thank you. You have apparently extended yourself. 

You’ve gone the extra mile in wanting to make sure this works. 

And I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for indulging me. I think this 

has been more than productive for our Committee. Thank you. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Thank the gentlelady. We welcome our guests 

from Denmark. And all Committee Members are advised that they 

have seven legislative days to revise and extend their remarks for 

the record. 

Once again, thank you, gentlemen, for your appearance here. Mr. 

Garcia? 

Mr. GARCIA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If I might, particularly 

timely, I think, the appearance of our colleagues in the Danish delegation. We did work a tremendously important child pornography 

case with the Danish authorities over the past several years, one 

that was recognized by NCMEC; a tremendous cooperative law enforcement effort on the front of protecting children. 

39

I would also just add my appreciation to you, Mr. Chairman, 

Congresswoman Jackson Lee, for having this hearing; being able to 

sit next to John Walsh, the most articulate spokesperson for the 

protection of children; and to hear words of support, words of real 

support, from Mr. Walsh, from this Committee. 

And that means so much to the men and women of ICE, who are 

out there every day doing this job, to the morale of those folks 

making the arrests, putting these predators behind bars, who realize that they are getting the recognition for the important public 

safety work that they do every day. So I thank you very much for 

that. 

Mr. HOSTETTLER. Hear, hear. Very good. Thank you. The business of this Subcommittee being completed, we are adjourned. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you very much. 

[Whereupon, at 11:49 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

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