U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested 13 people Friday at a PennDOT driver’s license center near Kittanning, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
Jason Koontz, a DHS spokesman, said ICE was called by East Franklin police after “concerned citizens reported an abnormally large amount of individuals” outside the facility.
The detained people allegedly are in the U.S. illegally and come from countries including Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan, according to Koontz. He said one of them resisted arrest and assaulted a law enforcement officer.
Koontz declined to provide further information, including whether the people remained in custody.
Armstrong County Sheriff Frank Pitzer told TribLive he heard about a large crowd of “foreign people” at the driver’s license center Friday morning. When he passed that information along to ICE, the agency did not indicate plans to visit the scene or detain anyone, according to Pitzer.
But by no later than 1:30 p.m., arrests were underway.
Pitzer said he was not given any advance notice. It’s unclear if ICE offered a heads up to any state or local officials. The state police declined to comment.
PennDOT and police from North Buffalo Township, where the license center is located, did not immediately return requests for comment.
Photos circulating on Facebook appear to show ICE agents chasing and detaining men outside the PennDOT driver’s license center.
Pitzer is concerned some people — whether or not they had legal status — may have fled when ICE arrived and could be hiding in the area. He views this a serious safety issue.
Everyone would have been accounted for, in his view, if other law enforcement agencies had been called to assist.
“We rely on ICE, and we 100% support these guys,” Pitzer said. “Their tactics are what I question.”
ICE arrests have become far more frequent under President Donald Trump, including in Southwestern Pennsylvania.