Latest news with #immigrationraid
CNN
4 days ago
- Politics
- CNN
A US citizen and Army veteran was detained at an immigration raid and held for 3 days. His family scrambled to find him
George Retes, a 25-year-old Army veteran and father of two, had been planning his three-year-old daughter's Minnie Mouse birthday party at the park for weeks. He would get her an inflatable bounce house, invite the whole family and shower her with gifts and treats. She was excited for the fun party and he was excited to see the smile on her face, he said. Those plans fell apart last week when Retes – a US citizen – was detained by federal immigration agents during an immigration raid and protest at a legal Southern California marijuana farm where he worked. Left injured and burned from pepper spray and tear gas, Retes was detained for three days without explanation, he said. His wife, who couldn't reach him during his detention, was scrambling to find out where her husband had been taken. And Retes missed the party he and his toddler had been dreaming about. Instead of seeing flickering birthday candles and hearing children's laughter on his daughter's birthday, the father found himself alone in a cell with bright lights that never turned off, his skin burning and limbs aching. As he laid on a thin mattress covering a cement slab, he wondered if he would ever see his family again. 'All I wanted was to be there for my daughter's birthday … I was so excited to watch her turn three and just enjoy her day and just watch her be happy for her day,' Retes told CNN. 'And it sucked not being there.' The arrest unfolded on July 10 when federal immigration officers carried out large-scale raids at two Glass House marijuana farms in Carpinteria and Camarillo and arrested over 300 people – part of an ongoing trend of immigration enforcement at worksites like farms and construction sites that have struck fear into immigrant communities. That day, Retes says he woke up and drove to work like he would any other day, not knowing there was unrest at his workplace. When he arrived at Glass House Farms in Camarillo – where he works as a contract security guard – he was met with throngs of protesters, cars piled up in the middle of the road and people standing in the street. He made his way through the crowd and was confronted by a barricade of agents blocking anyone from going into Glass House, he recounted. The Department of Homeland Security said Immigration Customs Enforcement and US Customs and Border Protection officers were executing warrants at the marijuana grow sites and were met with hundreds of protesters. He got out of his car and walked up to the agents to let them know he's an American citizen who's just trying to get to work. 'I didn't think it was gonna be a problem for me to go to work … as long as I identified myself and let them know what I was trying to do,' he said. The agents refused to listen to him, Retes said, so he returned to his car. That's when he says the situation escalated: The agents surrounded his car and started yelling conflicting orders to get out of his car, reverse and park his car, according to the father. Retes then reversed, trying to leave the tense scene, he said. Agents continued yelling, banged on his window and pulled on his door trying to get it open, he said. The uniformed federal agents eventually threw what appeared to be tear gas into the crowd of protesters, which blurred Retes' vision and made him choke. 'I'm trying to leave. I'm trying to get out of here,' Retes said he told the agents in between gasping breaths. At that moment, one agent shattered his driver's side window, and another sprayed pepper spray in his face, Retes said, recalling feeling a piece of glass from the window cut his leg. Then, they dragged him out of the car and threw him on the ground, pinning him down, he said. 'I had one agent kneeling on my back and another one kneeling on my neck,' said Retes, who noted he had neck and back injuries from his four-year Army service. Retes recalled telling officers he couldn't breathe because of the pepper spray and tear gas. But he said they proceeded to put him in handcuffs and dragged him away without explaining what he was arrested for. The Department of Homeland Security would later accuse Retes of assault – an allegation he vehemently denies. 'I just had no clue what was gonna happen to me,' Retes said. Retes became one of a number of US citizens and legal permanent residents detained or arrested in the tense raids amid the Trump administration's immigration crackdown – with some arrested without explanation and with no way to contact their families, immigrant advocacy groups say. Shows of force and clashes between immigration officers and protesters at raid sites have become periodical occurrences in the Los Angeles area as more people oppose the federal government's immigration enforcement actions. An EMT wrapped Retes' leg wound in gauze before the father was escorted into an unmarked SUV and taken to an empty field, where there were federal agents from several agencies, Retes said. Agents took his fingerprints and photos. And when Retes asked why he was detained, the agents wouldn't answer him, he recounted. 'They never told me anything … I sat there for hours asking them why I was here, why I'm being arrested, and no one could give me an answer,' Retes said. 'No one even knew who arrested me or why they arrested me. No one knew what was going to happen to me or who I was even going to go with.' Retes was eventually driven to downtown Los Angeles' Metropolitan Detention Center, where he was held by the US Marshals Service, online records show. He was booked, given prison clothes and placed in a holding cell with a professor who was detained during immigration protests that same day, Retes said. On Friday morning, Retes filled out his intake form and answered questions from the medical staff about his childhood, past and his life now. Based on his answers, they determined he should be put on suicide watch, where he remained alone in a cell with bright lights that never turned off, according to Retes. Guards were always outside his cell and a psychiatrist checked on him once a day to ensure he wouldn't harm himself, he said. In the cell for days, Retes was never told why he was arrested or if he was charged with any crimes, he said. Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, told CNN in a statement on Sunday that Retes had not been charged. The US Attorney's Office told CNN Friday it would not be pressing charges against Retes. McLaughlin later said Retes was detained for alleged assault, but did not provide details on the accusation. 'As CBP and ICE agents were executing criminal search warrants on July 10 at the marijuana facility in Camarillo, CA, George Retes—a U.S. citizen—became violent and refused to comply with law enforcement,' McLaughlin said Thursday. 'He challenged agents and blocked their route by refusing to move his vehicle out of the road.' Retes denies the agency's allegations. 'I would like to see where I assaulted an officer, and if that's true, why wasn't I charged?' he said. 'They could lie all they want. That's not what happened.' CNN has reached out to the US Marshals and US Customs and Border Protection for comment. Glass House said last week it received immigration and naturalization warrants on the day of the raids. 'As per the law, we verified that the warrants were valid and we complied. Workers were detained and we are assisting to provide them legal representation,' Glass House said in a statement. Retes described his detention as 'depressing, very confusing' and said he was 'so lost' for those three long days. In pain from his injured leg and burning skin, all he could think of as he was stuck alone in the cell was that he would miss his daughter's third birthday. 'I was there with my thoughts the entire time, wondering if I was ever going to get out, if anyone ever even knew my story or what had happened to me,' he said. 'I just thought I was never gonna see my kids again.' Though tear gas and pepper spray burned his eyes and skin, he was never given a chance to shower, he said. With an intense burning pain in his arms and legs, it was impossible for Retes to sleep on what he described as a cement block with a thin mattress and thin blanket, he said. And he never received medical care for the gash on his leg, even after he pleaded for it, Retes said. During his detention, Retes wasn't able to speak with an attorney or call his wife to let her know where he was, he said, adding that no one else called to let his loved ones know where he was. 'They didn't give them any information about where I was at,' he said. 'Any agency they called they were just giving them the runaround.' Meanwhile, his wife was calling anybody she could to find out where her husband was taken and speaking with local news stations through tears. 'I just don't know where he's at. I've been up since 6 a.m. trying to call the sheriff's, the police department, Oxnard, Camarillo, Ventura… They say they don't know,' his wife Guadalupe Torres told CNN affiliate KABC on Friday. The Federal Bureau of Prisons, which runs the Metropolitan Detention Center, declined to comment Friday on the conditions of Retes' confinement, citing privacy and security reasons, but told CNN in a statement that 'all individuals in BOP custody, regardless of housing assignment, are continually encouraged to maintain contact with loved ones, friends, and outside resources.' 'Each individual is independently treated on a case-by-case basis, and treatment is provided as clinically indicated, including referrals to specialists,' the statement read, in part. Finally, on Sunday, Retes was told he would be released and was walked downstairs, where he signed for his belongings and was told he was free to leave, the father recalled. 'So I basically was locked up for no reason, and missed my daughter's birthday for no reason?' Retes said he asked the guards. He says he was met with silence. Once he was outside, Retes was happy to feel the fresh air and the sun against his skin, he said. His wife picked him up and the couple headed to his parents' house to see their young daughter and eight-year-old son. 'I felt relieved to see a familiar face, and just at that moment when I saw her, I knew it was real that I was finally out,' Retes said of reuniting with his wife. Once they arrived at the house, the first thing Retes did was run up to his kids and hug them. They ran into his arms screaming 'Dad,' he said. 'It was the best thing ever, that feeling I'll never forget. It was so nice to finally … hold them,' Retes said. 'They were just really happy that I was out and that I was okay … it kind of just eased all their minds,' Retes said of his wife and children. 'We're just kind of trying to take it one day at a time.' But Retes – who said he joined the Army when he was 18 and was deployed in Iraq in 2019 – said he and his family are still in distress about the events of July 10. 'No one deserves to be treated the way I did,' he said. 'It shouldn't even matter if I'm a veteran, it shouldn't matter if I'm a US citizen or the color of my skin, or if I'm here illegally or I'm an immigrant.' Retes said he apologized to his daughter for missing her birthday. Because she's so young, he was unable to explain to her why he was gone, he said. 'It's just something that I'm gonna have to live with for the rest of my life,' he said. CNN's Zoe Sottile contributed to this report.
Malay Mail
5 days ago
- Malay Mail
Woman flees immigration raid, leaves husband and children behind
IPOH, July 19 — A foreign woman, believed to be from Sulawesi, fled and left behind her husband and two young children during a pre-dawn immigration raid at a construction site in Persiaran Panorama Lapangan Perdana here today. The family was among over 200 foreigners screened in the joint operation by the Perak Immigration Department and the General Operations Force. Her husband and children, aged two and three, were detained, while she escaped. Perak Immigration director Datuk James Lee said about 120 individuals were arrested for offences under the Immigration Act 1959/63 and related regulations. 'Our main focus tonight was on those using fake or expired documents, or staying in the country illegally,' he said. He urged employers to deal directly with the Immigration Department and avoid using middlemen. Those detained will be sent to the Home Ministry Complex, while undocumented children will be placed in a special depot. — Bernama
The Guardian
5 days ago
- The Guardian
Colleagues rally round California professor arrested during Ice raid on cannabis farm
Academics and colleagues are rallying around a California university professor who was arrested and charged with assaulting a federal officer during a chaotic immigration raid at a cannabis farm that resulted in a worker's death. John Caravello, a math and philosophy professor at California State University Channel Islands, joined a crowd of protesters who confronted immigration agents when they arrived at Glass House cannabis farm in Camarillo, a community about 50 miles north of Los Angeles. He was among hundreds of people who were arrested at the Glass House facilities in Camarillo and nearby Carpinteria. Those swept up in the raids include protesters such as Caravello, approximately 360 farm workers, and a US military veteran who worked as a security guard. The sweeping operation has since attracted widespread scrutiny, particularly after the death of a farm worker who fell from a greenhouse roof while attempting to hide from agents. The action is thought to be the largest raid in terms of arrests and the first death linked to the Trump administration's immigration crackdown in California. Caravello, who volunteered as an organizer and immigrant advocate alongside his teaching work, is accused of throwing a teargas canister at law enforcement agents and 'assaulting, resisting, or impeding' officers, according to an affidavit. But witnesses on the scene tell a different story. Genevieve Flores-Haro, associate director of Oxnard-based Micop (Mixteco Indigena Community Organizing Project), knows Caravello and was among the demonstrators present when he was arrested. On Thursday morning, Flores-Haro said the phones of her team of immigrant rights activists began blowing up with reports from family and friends that agents with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) were at Glass House farms. When they arrived on scene at the Camarillo farm just after 11am, Ice agents had already set up cones and yellow tape emblazoned with 'Customs and Border Protection' to block off the street. According to Flores-Haro, a crowd of demonstrators that eventually grew to around 200 people began chanting 'Chinga La Migra', which loosely translates to 'Fuck Ice'. Demonstrators also attempted to use their bodies to block the passage of Ice vans trying to leave with farm worker detainees. Instead of employing non-violent methods, says Flores-Haro, Ice agents brought out military-style vehicles and launched teargas into the crowd. Later, agents used additional teargas and rubber bullets against the demonstrators. 'The only teargas canisters that I saw thrown were by Ice agents and the national guard,' said Flores-Haro, who watched Caravello's arrest. Flores-Haro said Caravello appeared to be helping a fellow demonstrator who uses a wheelchair. She said she did not see him touch a canister, but some reports say Caravello attempted to remove a canister stuck beneath the demonstrator's wheelchair. Flores-Haro said the demonstration was largely peaceful and described use of teargas by officers as unnecessary. 'There may have been a few people acting out, but it did not merit this show of force. I'm an American citizen. I was born here. I'm a taxpayer, I'm a USC graduate. My taxpayer dollars were used by the federal government to shoot at me.' After being teargassed, Flores-Haro had difficulty breathing and is still experiencing a cough. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Ice did not respond to multiple Guardian requests for comment about Caravello's arrest and witness accounts of what happened at the farm. Bill Essayli, the recently appointed 39-year-old US attorney for California's central district, who is known as Donald Trump's enforcer in the immigration battle in Los Angeles, posted on X that Caravello was arrested for 'throwing a teargas canister at law enforcement'. Flores-Haro said she and Caravello had spoken out at a Camarillo city council meeting the night before the raid took place. During public comments, Caravello identified himself as a CSUCI professor and a longtime organizer with Ventura County Tenants Union and, more recently, a volunteer with VC Defensa, a coalition of local organizations dedicated to protecting immigrant and refugee populations in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. He asked council members to stand up against Ice's presence in the community, noting that many of his students and their families were undocumented. 'It's my responsibility to protect them, and so I've been patrolling the city streets following armed, masked thugs trying to kidnap my neighbors,' Caravello told the council. Caravello was released on a $15,000 bond on Monday but still faces criminal charges, and is scheduled to be arraigned on 1 August. When he walked free from the Los Angeles Metropolitan detention center earlier this week, a small crowd of supporters cheered, 'John Caravello, you deserve a medal for standing up for the community' – a chant that brought tears to the professor's eyes. In a statement, Cal State Channel Islands said: 'We are currently gathering additional information to fully understand the circumstances of the incident. At this time, it is our understanding that Professor Caravello was peacefully participating in a protest – an act protected under the first amendment and a right guaranteed to all Americans.' Because his case is still pending, Caravello declined to comment, but a California Faculty Association colleague, Theresa Montaño, said her friend was relieved to be released, yet still worries for other detainees. Families are still searching for the whereabouts of some farm workers and others have shown up in facilities as far away as El Paso, Texas. 'John is part of a labor union and activist organization,' said Montaño. 'Not everyone has those networks to fight for them.' Montaño also said she was confident Caravello, who she described as 'big-hearted', will ultimately be cleared. 'John is not guilty, and we have witnesses to attest to that,' says Montaño. 'He's a seasoned organizer. He would never throw anything at a federal agent.'
The Guardian
6 days ago
- The Guardian
Colleagues rally round California professor arrested during Ice raid on cannabis farm
Academics and colleagues are rallying around a California university professor who was arrested and charged with assaulting a federal officer during a chaotic immigration raid at a cannabis farm that resulted in a worker's death. John Caravello, a math and philosophy professor at California State University Channel Islands, joined a crowd of protesters who confronted immigration agents when they arrived at Glass House cannabis farm in Camarillo, a community about 50 miles north of Los Angeles. He was among hundreds of people who were arrested at the Glass House facilities in Camarillo and nearby Carpinteria. Those swept up in the raids include protesters such as Caravello, approximately 360 farmworkers, and a US military veteran who worked as a security guard. The sweeping operation has since attracted widespread scrutiny, particularly after the death of a farmerworker who fell from a greenhouse roof while attempting to hide from agents. The action is thought to be the largest raid in terms of arrests and the first death linked to the Trump administration's immigration crackdown in California. Caravello, who volunteered as an organizer and immigrant advocate alongside his teaching work, is accused of throwing a teargas canister at law enforcement agents and 'assaulting, resisting, or impeding' officers, according to an affidavit. But witnesses on the scene tell a different story. Genevieve Flores-Haro, associate director of Oxnard-based Micop (Mixteco Indigena Community Organizing Project), knows Caravello and was among the demonstrators present when he was arrested. On Thursday morning, Flores-Haro said the phones of her team of immigrant rights activists began blowing up with reports from family and friends that agents with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) were at Glass House farms. When they arrived on scene at the Camarillo farm just after 11am, Ice agents had already set up cones and yellow tape emblazoned with 'Customs and Border Patrol' to block off the street. According to Flores-Haro, a crowd of demonstrators that eventually grew to around 200 people began chanting 'Chinga La Migra', which loosely translates to 'Fuck US Immigration and Border Patrol'. Demonstrators also attempted to use their bodies to block the passage of Ice vans trying to leave with farmworker detainees. Instead of employing nonviolent methods, says Flores-Haro, Ice agents brought out military-style vehicles and launched tear gas into the crowd. Later, agents used additional teargas and rubber bullets against the demonstrators. 'The only teargas canisters that I saw thrown were by Ice agents and the national guard,' said Flores-Haro, who watched Caravello's arrest. Flores-Haro said Caravello appeared to be helping a fellow demonstrator who uses a wheelchair. She said she did not see him touch a canister, but some reports say Caravello attempted to remove a canister stuck beneath the demonstrator's wheelchair. Flores-Haro said the demonstration was largely peaceful and described use of teargas by officers as unnecessary. 'There may have been a few people acting out, but it did not merit this show of force. I'm an American citizen. I was born here. I'm a taxpayer, I'm a USC graduate. My taxpayer dollars were used by the federal government to shoot at me.' After being teargassed, Flores-Haro had difficulty breathing and is still experiencing a cough. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Ice did not respond to multiple Guardian requests for comment about Caravello's arrest and witness accounts of what happened at the farm. Bill Essayli, the recently appointed 39-year-old US attorney for California's central district, who is known as Donald Trump's enforcer in the immigration battle in Los Angeles, posted on X that Caravello was arrested for 'throwing a teargas canister at law enforcement'. Flores-Haro said she and Caravello had spoken out at a Camarillo city council meeting the night before the raid took place. During public comments, Caravello identified himself as a CSUCI professor and a longtime organizer with Ventura County Tenants Union and, more recently, a volunteer with VC Defensa, a coalition of local organizations dedicated to protecting immigrant and refugee populations in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. He asked council members to stand up against Ice's presence in the community, noting that many of his students and their families are undocumented. 'It's my responsibility to protect them, and so I've been patrolling the city streets following armed, masked thugs trying to kidnap my neighbors,' Caravello told the council. Caravello was released on a $15,000 bond on Monday but still faces criminal charges, and is scheduled to be arraigned on 1 August. When he walked free from the Los Angeles Metropolitan detention center earlier this week, a small crowd of supporters cheered, 'John Caravello, you deserve a medal for standing up for the community' – a chant that brought tears to the professor's eyes. In a statement, Cal State Channel Islands said: 'We are currently gathering additional information to fully understand the circumstances of the incident. At this time, it is our understanding that Professor Caravello was peacefully participating in a protest – an act protected under the first amendment and a right guaranteed to all Americans.' Because his case is still pending, Caravello declined to comment, but fellow California Faculty Association colleague Theresa Montaño said her friend was relieved to be released, yet still worries for other detainees. Families are still searching for the whereabouts of some farmworkers and others have shown up in facilities as far away as El Paso, Texas. 'John is part of a labor union and activist organization,' said Montaño. 'Not everyone has those networks to fight for them.' Montaño also said she was confident Caravello, who she described as 'big-hearted', will ultimately be cleared. 'John is not guilty, and we have witnesses to attest to that,' says Montaño. 'He's a seasoned organizer. He would never throw anything at a federal agent.'
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Army vet calls for investigation after being detained for three days in ICE raid
A U.S. Army veteran who was detained during the massive immigration raid in Ventura County last week said Wednesday that he wants 'a full investigation' into how he could have been held behind bars for three days despite being an American citizen. 'What happened to me wasn't just a mistake,' he said in a written statement. 'It was a violation of my civil rights. It was excessive force.' At a news conference Wednesday, George Retes, who is 25 and the father of two children, said he had been on his way to his job as a security guard at Glass House farms on July 10 when 'I got caught in the middle between protesters and [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] agents.' Retes had been focused on his 3-year-old daughter's upcoming birthday party and didn't realize that Glass House, one of the largest legal cannabis operations in California, was being raided by scores of heavily armed immigration agents. Read more: Immigration raid at cannabis farm in Ventura County sparks chaotic protest Officials with the Department of Homeland Security later said they detained more than 360 people in the raid, including numerous undocumented immigrants who had been charged with crimes. As agents moved through the company's greenhouses, many workers fled in a panic. One worker, Jaime Alanis Garcia, 56, died after he fell three stories while trying to evade capture. Protesters and family members of workers, meanwhile, massed at the Glass House gates on Laguna Road, squaring off against federal agents, who deployed chemical agents and less-lethal ammunition. Retes said he had worked at Glass House as a contractor for the security firm Securitas for seven months. He said he unwittingly headed straight into that melee as he drove down Laguna Road to report for his afternoon shift. 'I had no clue about it,' he said. 'When I pulled up, I saw all the cars, I saw all the traffic, and I was just trying to make my way through.' He did not get to work. Instead, he said, agents smashed his car window, pepper-sprayed him and dragged him out at gunpoint. 'I let ICE agents know that I'm a U.S. Citizen, that I'm American,' he said. 'They didn't care. They never told me my charges. They sent me away.' Read more: Details emerge about pot-farm immigration raid as worker dies Retes, who served in Iraq, said agents never told him why he was being detained at the federal Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles. He was packed off, without a phone call, access to a lawyer, or even a way to clean the pepper-spray residue off his clothes and face, he said. While in custody, Retes said, he became so distressed that he was put on suicide watch, but he was still not allowed to contact an attorney. His sister and wife meanwhile gave tearful interviews to local television stations, pleading for information as to his whereabouts. "We don't know what to do," his sister Destinee Majana told KABC-TV Channel 7 last week. "We're just asking to let my brother go. He's a U.S. citizen. He didn't do anything wrong. He's a veteran, disabled citizen. It says it on his car." "I just don't know where he's at. I've been up since 6 a.m. trying to call the sheriff's, the police department, Oxnard, Camarillo, Ventura,' added his wife, Guadalupe Torres. 'They say they don't know.' Finally, on Sunday, Retes said, guards came to his cell and told him he was going to be released. 'An officer walked me downstairs,' he recalled. "I signed a paper to get my stuff back. That was it. They let me go.' In a statement, officials at the Department of Homeland Security said: 'George Retes was arrested and has been released. He has not been charged. The [U.S. attorney's office] is reviewing his case, along with dozens of others, for potential federal charges related to the execution of the federal search warrant in Camarillo.' Retes said he is home in Ventura now, spending time with his children and 'enjoying being free. I took that for granted.' He recovered his car, which he said still has a smashed window, numerous dents and a sharp tang of pepper spray. But he said he plans to file a lawsuit against the government over the way he was treated. 'What they did isn't right,' he said. 'I'm here speaking for everyone who doesn't have a chance to speak.' Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
