Homeland Security bureau studies lessons of Spain bombings

In the wake of deadly bombings in Spain last week, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau is examining ways to beef up security, such as combing through databases for suspicious immigration patterns, protecting federal infrastructure or mobilizing explosives detection units, the agency's director said Wednesday.

Assistant Secretary Michael Garcia said ICE is waiting to receive initial results of the investigation into train bombs that killed 201 people last week in Madrid to determine how the bureau can help increase U.S. security efforts.

"We're going to have to look at what happened; look at what the vulnerabilities were, what the planning was, get the details on it and then look at that model and bring it back and go forward," Garcia said. "Right now, we're looking at rail security as [a border and transportation security] issue. Can we be of any help given our expertise in explosives detection?"

Garcia noted that ICE includes the Federal Protective Service, which guards about 8,800 federal facilities and uses canine explosives detection teams.

ICE is able to comb through databases to determine suspicious travel patterns in the United States, especially people who might have criminal records or be in violation of immigration laws.

"We can use our compliant enforcement systems very proactively to determine what the risk is, and [see if there is] information in our system that we can start to put together a picture emerging of a threat," Garcia said. "We've done that in the past and as we get information, we'll see if we can do that here."

He added: "You can take information, you can feed it into an ongoing investigation and look at geography, nationality, travel patterns and those types of things that we couldn't do in the past."

The federal commission investigating the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks concluded in a January report that immigration and law enforcement agencies failed to share information and prevent some of the attackers from illegally entering and remaining in the country.

According to Garcia, immigration and law enforcement tactics have improved, especially in the areas of border security, sharing database information between agencies, and the initial deployment of a biometric identification verifications system at airports and seaports.

"We've come tremendously far," he said. "I do see almost on a daily basis concrete examples of that tightening that will prevent those kinds of things from happening again."

Garcia also testified Wednesday on the fiscal year 2005 budget request for ICE before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security.

Garcia said the Homeland Security Department estimates there are about 7 million illegal aliens in the United States. About 450,000 are evading deportation orders, Garcia said, and of those, about 40,000 also are wanted for criminal offenses.

The budget would fund 30 new fugitive operations teams, which would be dedicated solely to apprehending and deporting alien absconders. Garcia predicted that the additional teams would help the agency catch about 25,000 absconders.