A former York County Jail corrections cadet was among a group of suspected illegal aliens taken into federal custody by U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at Cumberland County Jail last month.
Mauricio Romeu, 45, was one of five migrants arrested by ICE in a single day on Monday, Jan. 27.
Booking records at the jail indicated that ICE was holding Romeu on an immigration detainer, which the agency lodges against aliens who have been arrested on criminal charges and who the agency has probable cause to believe are deportable from the U.S.
Romeu was featured in a January 2024 article published by the Portland Press Herald entitled, “York County Jail makes gains in corrections staffing,” as one of 15 new recruits at the jail who were beginning a five-week training academy to become corrections officers.
Romeu was highlighted in the lead photo of the Press Herald article, which shows him speaking with York County human resources benefits specialist Doreen Staples.
At the time, the York County Jail was seeking out job applicants from the over 150 migrants from Africa that had arrived unexpectedly in Sanford in the spring of 2023 as a way to address chronic understaffing issues.
Lt. Mike Perry, Director of Recruiting and Training at the jail, told Sanford Springvale News in March 2024 “Hiring new Americans is a goal.”
“There’s a large pool of them. We’ve created a process for recruiting,” Perry told the outlet.
Under federal law, migrants who have pending asylum claims in order to remain in the U.S. are prohibited from obtaining work permits for a period of six months after filing for asylum.
York County Sheriff William King told The Maine Wire on Monday that the jail had indeed hired Romeu, and at the time of his hiring he was “legal to work in the U.S.”
“[Romeu] did not complete his probationary period and I cannot comment further due to privacy concerns,” Sheriff King said.
King denied that the jail has ever hired anybody living unlawfully in the United States.
According to ICE’s inmate locator, Romeu is originally from Angola, and has been transferred from Cumberland County Jail to the Torrance County Detention Center in New Mexico.
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