I'm proud to announce today a successful investigation conducted jointly by the Milwaukee Police Department and the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency. I'm joined today by Jeff Stillings, supervisor of the Milwaukee Office of ICE, with whom we enjoy a very strong federal local partnership. Operation Big Freeze, as it's called, put 21 gang members on ice, if you will, in a roundup last week that was conducted by Milwaukee police and ICE agents. The Milwaukee piece of this investigation started right here in District 2. District 2 officer Evelyn Lazlo, who's standing to my right, and Detective Tom Oberon to my left, from the intelligence fusion center, were conducting an investigation into the Mexican Posi regarding shootings, robberies, and arson on the south side. Since they have a strong partnership with ICE, they reached out to them to advise them of their investigation, whereupon they learned from ICE that Operation Big Freeze was in the planning stages and that they wanted to target criminal gangs. From there, a beautiful friendship blossomed. After three months of preparation with ICE, more than 30 Milwaukee police personnel from District 2, from the Criminal Investigations Bureau, from the Intelligence Fusion Center, from the Organized Crime Division, along with ICE agents, rounded up the bad guys. Now, you see behind me photographs of gang tattoos worn by many of the people that were arrested. Their violent pasts include carrying concealed weapons, robbery, drug dealing, weapons possession, drug possession. We believe they were responsible for literally dozens of crimes on the south side. Today, I'm pleased to stand with our officers from District 2, from the Criminal Investigations Bureau, as well as a representative from ICE to announce that we've identified those responsible for violent crime and that we, working together in partnership, have put these individuals under arrest and taken them off our streets. I'd now like to introduce Jeffrey Stillings from the Milwaukee Office of ICE. Jeff, thank you, Chief. ICE is proud to partner with the Milwaukee Police Department and other law enforcement agencies in targeting and dismantling violent street gangs in the Milwaukee area. Street gangs pose a significant and growing public safety threat to our communities and ICE is committed to targeting, arresting, and removing these individuals from our neighborhoods. Um, we're working hard on several different gangs in this part of town. Uh, at any given time, one or the other of them pokes their head up out of the gopher hole, if you will, and starts getting into a little bit more trouble than the rest. Um, MP has brought some attention to itself based on some of the activities that their members have been involved in lately, and this is one reason why, officer LLO and Detective Oberon started to focus their efforts on them. But uh certainly we are not going to stop paying attention to their colleagues in crime. Well, you know, it it covers the gamut. I mean, you know, the charges involved in this case are focusing largely on drug crimes as well as weapons possession, but certainly individuals affiliated with this gang have brought themselves to our attention, engaging the engaging in the entire gamut of street crimes. everything from a aggravated assault with firearms to weapons possession to burglaries to street robberies and to drug offenses. So they cover the gamut, but this particular roundup is largely concentrating on drug offenses. [Music]