Impacted staffing and the safety of corrections offices. Let me just finish by offering two recommendations to the committee to address this growing problem. First, i believe that congress can and should fund federal state and local task forces to focus on gangs. They could be modelled after the joint Terrorism Task forces and should have a Single National and coordinated infrastructure led primarily bay federal agency with significant input from local departments. These Regional Gang Task forces will need the full spectrum of support from centralized intelligence sharing and analysis to the prosecution in the u. S. Attorneys offices. Where federal grand juries and firm sentencing have the greatest impact on disrupting the gangs. The senate has previously enacted legislation to accomplish this purpose. But it was never approved by the house. Senator mccaskill, you mentioned that sometimes we have an impossible job. My last recommendation i urged congress to act to balance Citizens Rights to privacy with Law Enforcement needs to lawfully monitor and intersect criminal activity and potential deadly plots. The expanding issue of going dark, must be addressed at the federal level to afford local Law Enforcement and our federal partners, the legislation and the tools they need to legally access encrypted communications that are used to coordinate criminal activities. Thank you for holding this hearing and thank you for the assistance that you provide Law Enforcement throughout our nation. Thank you chief manger. Apologize 50 50 shots. Two out of three i was wrong. Not unusual. Senator langford has to leave, ill yield my position to senator langford. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. And gentlemen, thank you for being here and the preparation for this time for the incredibly compelling testimony in the issues that you bring in the complexity what have you deal with every day. And we appreciate your work very much. All three of you mentioned the interaction between ms13 and whats happening in Central America. Several of you mentioned specifically the coordinate efforts between Central America and Law Enforcement here both federal and their Law Enforcement in that spot. What can we do to help facilitate greater cooperation, whether that be fingerprint sharing, identity, Background Information between individuals that are being deported here back there and back there but also individuals moving in this direction as well. What coordination is missing because ms13 obviously is a strong Central American salvadorian especially presence there, what can we do . Just say that you touched on a couple of things that we need to do, first, our ability to remove, identified ms13 gang members that have been arrested or convicted of crimes oftentimes we have not only in Central America, but other nations in our world that will not accept their residents back. And we need to remove them from our country, and so if we can work on that issue, it would be very helpful, and as i mentioned in my testimony that the truce that was in place between gangs in el salvador and their government really did impact things in our country. And when that truce broke down, it had a very created a spike in violence in our country. So youre saying the gang truce broke down in el salvador and affected the violence directly here in the United States. Yes, sir. Okay. What other resources, what other cooperation do we need from Central American countries . I had the privilege to just return from el salvador and with my position with the fbis task force, aye been able to go down there approximately half of a dozen times. I just recently as saturday. The fbi has in place in place i salvador the tag, transnational antigang group. Their success prompted them to have another tag placed in h honduras and guatemala. What i believe were seeing in the metro boston area is the inability to refer to a database that doesnt just cover local ms 13 members but ms 13 members nationally as well as internationally. I feel like a database, the input was from both el salvador and the United States would assist in the vetting process of these unaccompanied children across the border. A lot of times in el salvador, they have information that the individual may have gang ties, possibly not a member. In return, in the United States, we have information that the individual has gang ties, whether or not he or she is a member. It would be a great asset if that information found its way to a Clearing House that they would have access to internationally and nationally and even at the local level. All three of you mentioned something along those lines. Is the fbi the correct doeposi depository for that . Is there enough to say fbi should be tasked to have this database, international and national . In the metro boston area which i can speak on with confidence, we speak to the fbi tag in specifically america specifically, guatemala and el salvador. The Massachusetts State Police speaks the fbi tag in el salvador and guatemala maybe even more often that that. It would be my opinion that the fbi already has in place those resources and to expand those resources would probably be the best course. Mr. Sini . I agree wholeheartedly as i mentioned in my testimony, that this database is Mission Critical to facilitating effective collaboration and eradicating these gangs from our communities here. What were seeing for the first time on long island is direct connections with young gang members to el salvador, so in the past weve seen connections from folks gang members in sufle k county to the west coast. Now its directly to el salvador, guatemala and honduras. In addition to the database, i would just add, we work closely with the fbi with fbis safe streets task force. However, a broad special Operations Division may also be worth looking at. My understanding is that is certain essentially a multiagency division and that could assist in this type of database. Whats very helpful is when we have a number pop in Suffolk County and we share that with our federal partners abroad who have assets in Central America and the type of analysis and intelligence that they can gain from a single number is both scary when you see all the connections but extremely helpful. What is missing in this database that doesnt already exist . It sounds like the cooperation is there, the relationships are there. Whats missing in this database, just that it hasnt been launched . Because the informations there. Its my opinion that we have a series of individual databases that dont always connect nationally and international and i think it would be an asset to be able to connect them internationally again because that would assist with us not only knowing whos coming into our community but also would assist the governments within Central America to know at times coming back. From conversations with government officials in el salvador, that was one of the things that they were struggling with, as their resources to include the fbis tag addressed the ms problem locally in el salvador and the 20, 25 individuals, just a short time later a plane arrives and 50 more gang members are brought back to their country and you have to continue the process again. So its important to address the problem in el salvador if we look at the problem that were experiencing here in the United States. Mr. Chairman, this is something that the Appropriations Team has already started on about Central America specifically and some of the investments and the way that were targeting, how were spending money in foreign aid and how we need to be able to target this specifically dealing with violence because it has an exact connection to whats happening here. I would encourage cooperation between these two committees and whatever we can do with the fbi to help them finish out this database. It sounds like a common solution here. So well work with you together on that. Senator mccaskill. When you all identify a gang member who is in this country illegally, are you getting Immediate Response from i. C. E. For deportation. When we arrest them we typically do. When the fingerprints get to Homeland Security, they identify them as somebody they would be interested in, yes. Let me ask about the countries who wont take them back and the problem that you just very laid out very well with us, when el salvador arrests people, we take them back. Have we had a problem with either guatemala or el salvador refusing to take people that we send back here who arent in this country legally . I wouldnt be the subject expect. Are you encountered not being able to get rid of a gang member that youre holding because a country wont receive them back . In massachusetts, and specifically on the task force that i work in, we havent had a problem we dont know of a problem where their country didnt take them back. There have been roadblocks at times where an individual committed a crime and was placed in custody, up for deportation, and the federal judge refused the order of deportation. But that would be completely different than the country not taking them back. Right, right. Thats a whole other issue. I know you all talked about money for Regional Task forces. I think this is one of those areas where weve got to be really careful with the budget that the president presented because while theyre putting more money into border security, we cant forget that a lot of the money burn grant money, you all know what these programs are because your departments depend on them, especially for Interagency Task force. This money is not wasted, its not soft stuff. This is whats giving you the tools. I wanted to make that comment because the president s budget was not always kind to programs like that. Let me ask you about prosecutors. You talked about, commissioner sini, about more lying u. S. Attorneys and i get that rico has tools that local prosecutors dont have within the rico umbrel umbrella, but are you getting cooperation from local prosecutors on these assaults, on these felonies . Is there not enough cooperation from your local d. A. S on this . Because all of these crimes obviously are state crimes, not federal crimes. Assault isnt even a federal crime. Murder isnt either. Im just curious what the local cooperation has been. As i mentioned before, part of our strategy is to target these gang members and make street arrests and ive mentioned weve made many arrests and the vast majority are prosecuted by our local District Attorneys Office so in that regard we get excellent cooperation from the District Attorneys Office. Where i would improve the collaboration among the Police Department, u. S. Attorneys office and District Attorneys Office is oftentimes youre able to develop probable cause and the ability to arrest an individual on local state murder charges much sooner than youre able to make a federal murder rico charge. So what i would like to see, if the machine was running perfectly, is once we have p. C. , once we have probable cause to make that state murder charge, that person is arrested, prosecuted in the state system. If were able to make that into a federal rico charge, bring that case over to the u. S. Attorneys office. Its a collaborative effort. Perhaps you have a special assistant District Attorney and a special so its coordinated. Exactly. Improved screening and post Placement Services is also one of your recommendations. I certainly am aware of the post Placement Services issue. We had a whole hearing, senator portman and i did, in psi about the incredible problem of hhs not really there has been some put the gang issue aside, there has been some horrendous treatment of these children in terms of being forced into child labor and other issues and clearly i think thats someplace that we need to continue to focus on that. Let me finally just ask you, its my understanding, commissioner and chief, that neither one of your departments will be participating in 287 g is that correct . Thats correct. Would you explain briefly why you will not be participating in 287 g. Although we believe that Mission Critical to collaborate with the department of Homeland Security to remove dangerous gang members from our streets, we also simultaneously have to create an environment in which undocumented individuals feel comfortable coming to Law Enforcement with information about crimes. Therefore, we do not, for example, inquire into the immigration status of those individuals who are coming to the police as a witness, as a victim, or someone merely seeking police assistance. In the same vain, we believe if we entered into a 287 g, it could hurt our ability to encourage witnesses and victims to come forward. With that said, whenever we arrest an individual for a crime, misdemeanor or felony, and that person is not here legally, we automatically notify the department of Homeland Security. Chief manger, your department was listed on i. C. E. s jurisdiction that supposedly didnt cooperate with them. Obviously what the commissioner just described is the ultimate cooperation. Its paying attention to your Public Safety mission which has to be foremost. Youre the only one that answers 911 calls. Im not aware of anybody else in the entire criminal Justice System that answers 911 calls besides your department. So what witness stand the downfall of you being listed as a department that failed to cooperate with i. C. E. , and what was the impact on your ability to, in fact, put criminals in prison . The biggest challenge that ive had is to try and make sure that what a number of our elected officials have said has not been misinterpreted by our federal colleagues. The fact is we are not now, nor have we ever been a sanctuary du jurisdiction. We have found as we believe as i mentioned, Montgomery County is onethird immigrant when you look at our population, and i think the commissioner described it perfectly. Weve got to find that balance of whats right for Public Safety in our jurisdiction. If people are afraid to come forward to report crime, be witnessed to crime, our jurisdiction is less safe. We dont inquire about peoples immigration status. However, if we arrest someone, we cooperate fully with i. C. E. We respond to every one of their inquiries. The issue where i think many jurisdictions run into the challenge and weve been talking to Homeland Security about this forever, are the issue of the detainers. I think many people look at the issue of whether we honor a detainer or not, that is hold someone beyond when they would normally be released as a political decision. It is not. It is a legal decision. We have been instructed by the federal circuit, fourth circuit. Weve been given instructions by our attorneys that we can hold these folks until the time when they would be released. At this point we will notify i. C. E. Theyre being released. If i. C. E. Can get them, theyre welcome to them. Well give them notice ahead of time when theyre going to be released if we have that information. We had a case recently that i. C. E. Took the opportunity to put a press release out on, saying that Montgomery County released a dangerous person back into the community. It was a mistake. We had a detainer, we should have honored it. It was unexpected that a judge was going to release this person and we didnt notify i. C. E. When i say we, it was our corrections department. It was a mistake, fixed the next day and the person was taken into custody the next day. That does not overcome the it does not. The fact of the matter is we are doing the same thing that Suffolk County is doing and about 90 of the Police Departments in this country are doing. We have found that balance where we do not want to be the immigration police, but we absolutely cooperate and help our federal partners. Make no mistake, you guys are handling 95 of the Violent Crime that occurs in this country, not the federal authorities. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Ill take senator langfords question. That would be senator hassan. On that same line of questioning, is there any federal law that you would want to see changed or modified to help you do your job as it relates to gang activities and dealing with i. C. E. In terms of detainers and Immigration Law . Were bound by case law, and when were informed by our attorneys that we would be liable for false imprisonment if we do not release someone when theyre entitled to be released, thats a problem. So if there could be a change in the law that give those detainers the strength of a warrant, because if we have a warrant, we will hold someone and that is, i believe, the easiest solution, is to get a warrant to hold somebody. That gives us the Legal Authority to do so. Again, your concern about your liability and ive heard t