LOS ANGELES (AP) — Federal immigration agents arrested a U.S. citizen and took his car with a child in the back seat and drove off from the scene of a raid in Los Angeles, advocates and family said Wednesday.
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On a video provided by immigrant advocates, masked and armed agents are seen arresting a man by his car in a parking lot while his 1-year-old daughter is strapped into a car seat in the back. After the man is led away, agents are seen getting into the front of the car and driving off with the girl still inside.
The man is a U.S. citizen who was at the scene of a federal immigration raid at a Home Depot store in Los Angeles, said Lindsay Toczylowski, co-founder of Immigrant Defenders Law Center. The firm, which handles immigration cases, was contacted by community members for help reuniting the family, but isn’t representing the man because he is American, she said.
“It was a dangerous act to have armed men get in a car with that child and remove her from the situation,” Toczylowski said, adding relatives picked up the child later that day from federal offices in Los Angeles. “They should have followed protocols that had the best interest of that child in mind.”
U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials did not immediately respond to questions about why agents drove the man’s car or took the child.
In an email, an agency spokesperson said a U.S. citizen was arrested for investigation of assault on Tuesday after carrying a hammer and throwing rocks at Border Patrol agents carrying out a raid at a Home Depot store in Los Angeles while a child was in his car. Five immigrants were arrested during the operation on suspicion of immigration violations, the spokesperson said.
It was not immediately known where the man was on Wednesday, more than 24 hours after his arrest. His mother, Maria, told reporters, the family received a call from an unknown number Tuesday to pick up the girl at Border Patrol offices in Los Angeles, so they did. She said the child is fine but asking for her father, who was born in California and works in the restaurant industry.
Maria said she and the girl are also U.S. citizens. She declined to provide her last name to protect her granddaughter’s identity.
“It’s something very frightening,” she said in Spanish after seeing the video. “You don’t know who those people are.”
It seems like the “innocent’ father threw rocks and otherwise attacked Federal officers doing their job. Throwing rocks is assault. I know of life altering injuries that happened to relatives. Having a child nearby is NOT a get out of jail card.
Pace Mr Toczylowski, there’s absolutely nothing dangerous about the scenario as described. The toddler was certainly better off being cared for by the authorities than by her psycho father, who took her to a political protest.
It’s time we don’t fall prey to the nonsense being portrayed as cruelty by the leftists who have an agenda. Perhaps the perp should not be throwing brinks and rocks at federal agents. Certainly not when his family can be entangled.
What are they supposed to do, leave the kid on the side of the road?
VIN needs to stop using AP articles, especially from this guy Feldman who’s name is on many of these articles.
This entire article was a propaganda piece to convince you that ICE is arresting innocent American citizens while carelessly hurting children. The guy was arrested for throwing rocks at federal agents with his kid in the car! Not for suspicion of being illegal! It would have been a bigger problem if they didn’t arrest him. Then they had to do something with the car and the kid. Should they have left the kid alone on the side of the road?!?
The entire article is completely deceptive and dishonest. From reading some of the other comments here it looks like some other people were actuality fooled by this guy.
It’s not ok. We have enough secular news outlets spewing out twisted and inaccurate stories to support their leftist narrative. We don’t need Jewish outlets doing that too.
More AP propaganda for the democrats they shill for.
Maybe if the father wasn’t breaking the law, everything would be ok.
FACT: Latino voters have turned against GOP for the ICE raids and atrocities like this one.
Whether we want to admit it or not, this type of stuff hurt the GOP in Tuesday’s elections. The people see this, and they hear from our fake news how nothing is better since Trump came in (don’t tell anyone that a gallon of gas is way lower than anytime in the last 4-5 years; that crime is down even in cities that didn’t get the National Guard; that illegal border crossings are down to something in the neighborhood of zero; that inflation, which averaged 5% under Biden, is now 2%…. and on and on), so they go back to their sacred cow Dems. Such rather cruel bravado is not positive, and Trump should have been making big noises about being more balanced in the deportation efforts since the very beginning.
PROJECT 1933 Goon Squad arresting Americans now! ARE YOU NEXT?
We only hire the best. We only arrest ands deport violent criminal gangs Tarrifs are paid by China, not by real American businisses. The moon is made out of green chesze. I run Israel and I tell BIBI what is best. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER.
disgraceful……Unamerican