ICE Occupies Joliet With Joliet Police's Help? Chief Brown Sets The Record Straight During City Council

JOLIET, IL — This week's Joliet City Council meeting's audience participation time was dominated by five members of the community insisting that ICE agents were conducting a reckless operation on the city's east side — even though Joliet Police Chief Robert Brown put those rumors to rest. Joliet's interim chief took to the podium at the suggestion of Mayor Terry D'Arcy.

Brown subsequently let everyone know that Joliet police were not working in any capacity whatsoever with ICE. Rather, this was a U.S. Department of Homeland Security arrest warrant and Joliet police was made aware of it ahead of time.

"Chief Brown, can I ask you to talk about the posture the Joliet Police has so the community understands what that is?" Mayor D'Arcy announced.

Brown then came forward and made the following remarks in regard to the Monday morning incident on the city's east side, near Henderson Avenue and Virginia Street.

About five people showed up at the scene to produce Facebook videos and Facebook Live videos claiming to their viewers that ICE was working in Joliet looking for someone named Rene.

First off, as he began his City Council remarks, Chief Brown explained that Joliet police are following Illinois state laws.

"We cannot interact or stop ICE agents from doing their retainer warrant. Now this thing that occurred yesterday, I know there's a lot of rumors that are spread around," Brown advised everyone. "We were notified by Homeland Security investigations that they actually had an active federal arrest warrant, and they specifically said we are not ICE. We are not doing the retainer ... so we just want to be clear, it is an active warrant. All we want you guys is for public safety ... so there's nothing going on. They were worried that the public was going to come out and attack them. So, there were some officers dispatched to the area."

In regard to ICE, Chief Brown later remarked, "we do not go on retainer warrants. We do not participate in it. We've requested and asked them if they do come into Joliet, they notify us, but they are the federal government, so they don't have to listen and most of the time, they don't tell us. They just come here. We'll get called from the community saying this is what's going on ... we cannot when they're working, we cannot interfere with them."

Prior to Chief Brown's remarks laying to rest the false accusations that spread across social media on Monday suggesting that ICE was in town with Joliet police's full support and help, Rosa Hernandez, a former Joliet City Council candidate, and Alicia Morales, a former Joliet Township government official, took to the Council podium to make their comments.

"I know what I saw and it was ICE," Hernandez falsely claimed to the City Council. "You guys can sit here and tell me it was not ICE, it was ICE. It doesn't matter what it was, like they say, but what are we hiding?

"My thing is, why was Joliet police assisting them? They should not be helping them ... someone said it was crowd control. It was five people, the person they were trying to arrest, me, two minors and this other lady ... we were not trying to interfere... community members need to feel safe ... I don't want to see Joliet in the news for what we've seen in other communities. They shoot people. They kill people, that's not what we are, and I hope that you guys will talk to your police officers and tell them if they are going to be helping or assisting ... because seriously, it's always going to be us hurt, not the ICE agents. We've seen it. We see people get beat up, get killed, even disappear. I don't want that here. There's no room for them in Joliet, thank you."

As for Hernandez, she was back at it on Wednesday night, using her Facebook page to alert her followers that around 9:30 p.m., "Joliet, near Gompers on Briggs someone was arrested, there was a police car and two more cars covered, one gray and one black. Check on your people, it was a white van and they were looking for something in the van and they took a person."