A suspected incident of petty theft unfolded in Rotterdam, a bustling suburban neighbourhood of Schenectady. The episode included a Hispanic duo allegedly involved in furtively placing goods in a stroller, home to a 3-year-old toddler, at a Hannaford supermarket. The local law enforcement cameras picked up on the pair’s deeds. Interestingly, Michel Garcia Rojas, the man accused, held a identification that testified to his past profession as a Nicaraguan police officer. His alleged accomplice was Maria Duque-Muriel, originating from Colombia, possessing noncitizen status much like himself.
In a town with a population of around 30,000, police encountered a unique situation: dealing with undocumented suspects involved in a minor crime while being accompanied by a young child. The presence of the child complicated circumstances. One of the responding officers, as recorded by body camera footage, expressed feeling confliced on the course of action. Consequently, the officer reached out to a superior for guidance.
The advice from above steered the handling of the case towards U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, setting into motion one of the initial applications of the Laken Riley law in New York. This federal mandate orders the detention of undocumented immigrants alleged to have committed a range of criminal acts from theft to assault, extending up to murder.
This incident serves as fodder for the ongoing contentious discourse among legislators regarding immigration regulations. The arrest of the couple, accused of stealing groceries worth less than $200, shines a light on the predicament non-citizens face when involved in seemingly minor infractions. The incident triggered serious repercussions for the two, especially after Garcia Rojas allegedly grew aggressive upon being transferred to ICE, leading to charges of assaulting a federal agent.
In addition to this, Ms. Duque-Muriel found herself set onto the path of deportation, complicated further by a sharp, painful separation from her child. According to prosecutors, it appears the pair entered the Capital Region through unauthorised immigration from the southern border. Notably, Duque-Muriel was residing in Rotterdam as part of a social program, detailed in the police records and confirmed by a local activist.
An intriguing aspect of the case comes to light when considering that their alleged act of shoplifting would normally have been resolved with a summons ticket. Progressive factions along with some Democratic legislators are expressing support for a state bill, limiting the interaction between local police departments, such as the ones in Rotterdam, and ICE. They advocate that local police should not be involved in immigration violations, classed as civil rather than criminal issues.
These activists posit that an atmosphere of fear, spurred by deportation fears, might discourage immigrant victims from reporting crimes due to apprehensions about arrest. On the other side, Republicans, both locally in Albany and nationally in Washington, are fervently opposing such ‘sanctuary policies’. Their belief frames any illegal immigrant’s crime as a criminal act that should never have taken place.
As the state legislative session draws to a close in the following days, lawmakers express reservations about the nature of immigration bills that are likely to pass. A recent protest cum sit-in staged by immigrant rights advocates disrupted traffic flow outside the State Capitol for a duration exceeding one hour.
The arresting officers arrived on the scene based on a mere report of a shoplifting incident. The couple had been detained in a small security room within the Hannaford supermarket premises. The body camera footage of the officers reveals the store staff’s narration of the alleged theft.
As per the account from the store employee, the couple concealed more than a dozen items in the toddler’s stroller during their shopping journey through the store aisles. The total value of the theft summed up to $159.07, as evident on a receipt included in the arrest documentation.
Typically, a charge of petit larceny does not warrant detention, but rather issuance of a court notice for a subsequent date. However, in this case, the situation escalated out of the ordinary. The Laken Riley law, conceived in memory of a nursing student from Georgia who lost her life to a criminal act by an illegal immigrant in 2022, extends to crimes such as the shoplifting perpetrated by the couple.
As per the mandate of this law, Garcia Rojas found himself under mandatory detention at the Albany County jail, pending the resolution of the charges against him. Garcia Rojas rejected a proposal for an interview and his legal counsel has declined to offer a comment. The charge levied against him comes with the potential of a stiff sentence of up to twenty years.
Twinning Garcia Rojas’s uncertain destiny, Duque-Muriel, too, faced detention, transferred to another jail concerning her prior illegal immigration. She also retains a legal representative who declined the opportunity to comment on the unfolding case.
As a by-product of Duque-Muriel’s arrest, she experienced a forced parting from her child in March. Court records from Rotterdam denote a worrying fact: neither of the two suspects showed up for their court hearing regarding the shoplifting charge.
A local judge signed warrants seeking the arrest of both Duque-Muriel and Garcia Rojas after their failure to attend the scheduled court date. This case serves as a polarizing example of the unanticipated consequences that materialize when non-citizens involve themselves in petty crimes, providing an ammunition for either side of the contentious immigration law discourse.