Big drop in immigrant arrests at AZ border
Web Producer: Marissa Pasquet
PHOENIX (AP) - The head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection says the number of illegal immigrants caught by the Border Patrol last year in southern Arizona dropped by more than 40 percent.
Alan Berson says about 123,000 illegal immigrants were arrested in the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector between October 2010 and September 2011. That's a 42 percent decrease from the 212,000 immigrants detained in the previous 12 months.
The much smaller Yuma Sector saw its arrests go from 7,115 to 5,833, an 18 percent decline.
Illegal immigrant arrests along the entire U.S.-Mexico border peaked at 1.6 million in 2000, including more than 616,000 in the Tucson Sector.
The numbers are preliminary. Total arrests last fiscal year are expected to be at their lowest levels since 321,000 in 1972.
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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