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Immigration See other Immigration Articles Title: Immigration Not Worried About Deliveryman Immigration Not Worried About Deliveryman By TOM HAYS NEW YORK (AP) -- Front-page headlines about a deliveryman who spent three days trapped in an elevator drew attention to the China-born worker's immigration status, but federal officials suggested he had little to fear. "Getting locked in an elevator for three days doesn't make you immune to removal proceedings," said Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman Marc A. Raimondi. But top priority, he said, goes to aliens "who pose the greatest threat to public safety and homeland security." Ming Kuang Chen's ordeal ended with his rescue early Tuesday, 80 hours after he vanished while delivering Chinese food to a high-rise Bronx apartment building. News stories said he had entered the country illegally from the Fujian Province in southeastern China. Chen appeared briefly at a news conference on Tuesday after being released from a hospital where he was treated for dehydration. Officials offered no information on his whereabouts Wednesday. He had become the subject of a widespread search after he failed to return to his restaurant Friday night with $200 in receipts, prompting fears that he was the victim of a fatal mugging. Police spent the weekend going door to door in the high rise, but firefighters pulled Chen free only after responding to an emergency call. Chen, who speaks little English, said he had repeatedly cried out and pushed an alarm button in the elevator. The disclosure of Chen's immigration status raised questions about how the information became public. Under city rules, police are allowed to seek a victim's residency information for investigative purposes, but they may not disclose it to anyone else. Mayor Michael Bloomberg told reporters he was unaware of any city official releasing Chen's immigration status and blamed the reports on unauthorized leaks. "Unfortunately, as you well know, sometimes people just for a variety of selfish reasons ... try to leak information and it's unconscionable," he said Wednesday. "His immigration status had nothing to do with it whatsoever and should not have been divulged, clearly." The Associated Press had reported the detail, based on accounts by other media. Being in the country illegally is no big deal, but exposing that fact apparently is.
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