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Pinellas County joins program to deport criminal aliens

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TBO.com

Published: November 12, 2009

TAMPA - Pinellas County has joined Hillsborough County in a year-old federal program to help identify and deport criminal aliens.

The Secure Communities initiative, which brings different law enforcement resources to screen jail inmates, is now in 12 Florida counties. The program celebrates it's first anniversary today.

ICE says Secure Communities streamlines the process for ICE to determine whether someone is a deportable criminal immigrant.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told reporters during a conference call todaythat the program "means most importantly finding and removing dangerous criminal aliens who pose a threat to public safety."

In its first year, the program identified more than 100,000 criminal aliens, said ICE Assistant Secretary John Morton.

A goal of the program is to be available to every law enforcement agency in the country by 2013.

Napolitano said the technology helps make the process fair and less susceptible to racial profiling because every jail inmate is screened through fingerprints, the FBI's biometric system and immigration databases.

Other participating Florida counties are Brevard, Broward, Charlotte, Clay, Collier, Duval, Marion, Miami-Dade, St. Johns, and St. Lucie.

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