Immigrant rights group plans walk from Chicago to Woodstock

Immigrant rights activists are planning a three-day, 53-mile walk from Chicago to the McHenry County Jail this weekend to demonstrate against deportations and to call for reform.

The walk, organized by the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, will include at least 100 and be punctuated by visits to churches across the Northwest suburbs.

The McHenry County Jail in Woodstock is targeted as the ending point because it houses a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility, where suspected illegal immigrants are held before deportation.

"When we are picking people up and deporting them for nonviolent offenses, we are destroying those families and putting a big burden on our society," said Jessica Palys, a spokeswoman for the coalition.

Palys' group is raising concerns about collar counties that have signed on to ICE's Secure Communities program that makes it easier to find backgrounds on undocumented immigrants through fingerprints with the goal of having those with criminal convictions or pending charges quickly deported.

ICE says the system is intended to prioritize deportations so those with violent convictions or charges are removed from the country first.

Palys argues it is being used at times to ship off undocumented immigrants who have been pulled over for minor traffic violations.

Palys also says the march should bring attention to the need for immigration reform that includes both a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants in the country now and stronger security at the nation's borders and ports.

The march is set to kick off at a church on Chicago's West Side Friday morning and hit Countryside Church Unitarian Universalist in Palatine Saturday at 10 a.m., followed by a 10:45 a.m. stop at St. Thomas Catholic Church in Crystal Lake on Sunday.