Owner OKs Raid, INS Arrests 62 at Hollywood Park

U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service agents raided Hollywood Park race track early Wednesday--with the consent of owner Marjorie L. Everett--and arrested 62 suspected illegal alien grooms and stable employees.

The raid, part of a continuing campaign by the INS to crack down on horse trainers in Southern California who hire illegal aliens, marked the first time that a race track owner has voluntarily opened a facility to immigration agents.

“So far as I’m concerned,” Everett said, “the government will be able to come into this park forever, without a warrant, any time they want to. We naturally, all of us, wish this action didn’t have to be taken. . . . But we believe in our government and believe (it) should be supported.”

“We applaud her effort,” said Ernest Gustafson, INS district director for Los Angeles. “It is a sign that she really doesn’t want illegals at the track. It also could send a message to other track owners.”

Minimize Danger

The raid was conducted at 4 a.m. to minimize any possible danger to horses or inconvenience to track operations, INS officials said.

The 62 people taken into custody were mostly Mexican citizens living in track buildings, officials said. They said a Guatemalan woman, who was reportedly working as a prostitute at the track, was also arrested.

Wednesday’s raid marked the fourth time INS agents have raided a Southern California race track in the last three months. Agents detained 123 suspected illegal aliens at Del Mar in San Diego County on Aug. 23, 50 at the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds in Pomona in September and 169 at Santa Anita in Arcadia on Oct. 24. None of the three earlier raids had the full cooperation of the owners involved, Gustafson said.

The Santa Anita raid was conducted only after the INS obtained a court warrant. After the raid, the Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Assn., which represents trainers, went to court to seek a restraining order to prohibit further raids and to declare the Santa Anita search warrant invalid on the grounds that it did not list any suspected illegal aliens by name, Doug Atkins, secretary-treasurer of the association, said Wednesday.

The association’s legal request has been delayed on the court calendar until at least Dec. 26 as part of an agreement the INS made with the association not to raid Santa Anita, an INS spokesman said.

Atkins criticized the Hollywood Park raid and accused the INS of “sabotaging” an agreement that the association had worked out with trainers to legitimize the immigration status of their grooms and stable employees.

He said the trainers have filed applications with the U.S. Labor Department to obtain visas that would allow a still-undecided number of experienced workers to remain in the country legally, if it is determined that no legal workers with similar experience are available.

Atkins said, however, that he did not know if any of the workers arrested Wednesday are among those seeking such waivers.

Joint Meetings

Assistant INS District Director Joe Thomas, who has attended joint meetings with the horsemen’s association representatives, said the INS had agreed only not to raid Santa Anita while such petitions were being considered and that the agreement did not pertain to raids conducted with the cooperation of owners at other tracks.

He also said the track at Los Alamitos in Orange County could be surveyed as well, because Everett, who also owns that facility, has agreed to open its doors to INS agents.