Group in Highland Park seeks to install sirens to warn about ICE raids

A group in Highland Park is looking to use sirens to signal when ICE agents are in their neighborhood.

Neighbors want to use the sirens to alert residents near Figueroa Street, where immigration operations have happened in the past, so that they can avoid the area. 

Dennis Lopez, who lives in the area, does not support the idea and says he believes it could cause more panic on the street.

“It’s not a good idea because it will cause more problems,” Lopez said. 

Community members created the Highland Park community support group and began crowdsourcing to gather the money to purchase air raid sirens.

The group says the idea is to alert families that agents are in the area but also alert neighbors to come out and watch what is happening to hold agents accountable.  

“Come out and see what they are doing because there has to be accountability,” Tony Abregó, who lives in the area, said. 

The group organizing the system said they hope to have everything set up by the end of the month. 

First Assistant U.S, Attorney for Central District of California, Bill Essayli, issued a statement saying: “I would admonish these anti-government activists that it is a federal crime to harbor or assist in harboring illegal aliens. They should familiarize themselves with 8 U.S.C. 1324(a), which carries a penalty of up to 5 years in federal prison.”  

Essayli’s statement was in reference to a federal law that defines a broad range of offenses related to the smuggling of undocumented immigrants.

The immigration enforcement operations that are part of President Trumps mass deportation campaign promise intensified in Los Angeles in June and have continued for months.