LAKE COUNTY - A 33 year old man living illegally in the U.S., who reportedly threatened to kill 37 on a Greyhound bus as it traveled from Milwaukee to Chicago, is now being held in Lake County, Illinois, where the top law enforcement officer Sheriff Mark Curran, advocates protecting illegal residents.
According to the Racine County Sheriff's Department, around 9:45 p.m. Saturday night, a passenger called 911 saying a person on the bus was threatening to shoot and kill people.
The Greyhound bus came to a stop just south of the Wisconsin-Illinois border after Racine County law enforcement set up stop sticks. No one on the bus was injured.
The accused, Margarito Vargas-Rosas, faces charges for felony terroristic threats and disorderly conduct and is being held in Lake County. Law officials said Vargas-Rosas lives in Chicago, considered by Mayor Rahm Emanuel as one of Illinois' "sanctuary" cities.
Lake County's Sheriff Curran told Sun-Times columnist Mark Brown last year the TRUST Act he encouraged Governor Bruce Rauner to sign into law would not have changed the way his office handled illegals. It would simply make the Lake County policy apply statewide.
The legislation requires that local police not comply with immigration detainers and warrants not issued by a judge. Curran said that’s already standard practice.
But writing it into the law could help stop other sheriffs or police chiefs from going rogue, supporters say.
In addition, the TRUST Act would prevent local police from stopping, searching or arresting anyone based on their immigration or citizenship status.
Curran told Brown,
“I’m a rule of law guy, yes, but you can’t have a history where we had wide open borders, where we didn’t enforce these laws forever because we desperately needed the labor and knew that our immigration process was screwed up … and then 20 years later tell them, ‘You’re here illegally.”
“In order to police these communities, protect these communities from the true predators, you have to be able to pull up with lights and all and not have widespread fear and panic among citizens that really have nothing to do with the crime.”
