NEW YORK, CMC - Two immigrant advocacy groups say they have found that United States Immigration border patrol agents who arrest Caribbean and other immigrants in New York State get gift cards, bonuses and extra vacations.
The Families for Freedom and the New York University (NYU) Immigrant Rights Clinic said in a new report that the rewards include US$100 Home Depot gift cards. They said some agents also got as much as US$2,500 a year each.
The groups said they had sued the government under the Freedom of Information Act, discovering that supervisors in the agency's upstate Buffalo sector, which extends across 29 counties in New York and Pennsylvania, gave out close to one million dollars in cash awards to agents from 2003 to 2011.