F.B.I. OUSTS NIPPONESE IN ISLAND RAID

LOS ANGELES, Monday, Feb. 2.--(UP)--Nearly 500 alien Japanese fishermen were forcibly evacuated from the vulnerable Los Angeles Harbor area early today in a surprise raid carried out by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

By Associated Press.

SAN PEDRO, Calif., Monday, Feb. 2.--Male Japanese aliens on Terminal Island were taken into custody today by 180 federal, city and county officers are being held at the Immigration Station on the island.

J.W. Vincent, assistant chief of the Los Angeles F.B.I. office, said that the aliens would be held under presidential warrants pending hearings before enemy-alien boards. Later, he said, those aliens the boards do not release will be given "an opportunity to decide between leaving the country and being interned for the duration."

The Japanese population of the island, a vital naval and ship-building center in Los Angeles Harbor, is about 2,200, of whom about 800 are aliens. Male aliens, mostly fishermen and cannery workers, are said to total 400.

As soon as the officers reached the island in police radio cars, just as dawn was breaking, the drawbridge was lifted.

The island had not been named by Attorney-General Francis Biddle as out-of-bounds in a list of West Coast regions which must be vacated by Japanese and other enemy aliens before February 24.

Officers said those taken into custody today were booked as "enroute to the immigration office," but their exact fate in this move to counteract espionage and sabotage was not announced.