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Noemi Ciau visited Westchester Hand Wash on Sunday and dropped pizza on her husband, who works as a cleaner. It was around noon when they met and chatted for a few minutes.
Ciau was shopping for her daughter later that week to wear her 8th Grade Graduation, she told him.
“If you need money or anything, call me,” she recalls telling him to her.
Ciau will not see her husband again, as 52-year-old Jesus Cruz was taken hours later by a federal immigration agent who raided the car wash.
The business was one of at least five car wash cleaners in Los Angeles and Orange counties that have recently been targeted, according to the Clean Carwash Worker Center, a labor advocacy nonprofit that was able to verify these attacks through community reports and footage on social media.
Clean determined that at least 26 people had been taken to immigration enforcement agents at these locations. Some of these are unmarked vehicles.
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The majority were workers, but one customer was also greeted with Culver City Express Handcar Wash and Details during Sunday’s raid.
Ciau, a resident of Inglewood, spoke with other families of the detained workers at a press conference held by Clean at Culver City Car Wash Wednesday morning. She said she relied on her husband to take care of the children in the evening as she works in Luxe in the morning.
“He was my backbone,” she said.
“Now, her father can’t even be there to graduate,” Ciau said.
Clean’s executive director Flor Melendrez said her organization is in a hurry to identify those detained and catch up with the new car wash attack in real time.
“The agents are armed. They grab people and put them in vehicles. That’s why they don’t identify themselves,” Mellendres said.
The US Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment.
In addition to Westchester hand wash and Culver City Express hand car wash and details, Melendles said Crenshaw Imperial Car Wash, Whittier Touch and Glow Wash and Magnolia Car Wash in Orange County.
Westchester Hand Wash and Culver City car washes were hit twice in a row.
In Westchester, several workers who ran on Sunday were able to escape, but four people were arrested and taken to agents, according to Mehmet Aidouan, the owner of the car wash. Two other workers were taken when the agents returned the next day, the Aid Party said.
The Aid Party told the agents in an interview that he could answer their questions, he said that he had documents for his workers but they were not interested.
Video footage obtained and reviewed by the Times shows another person calmly talking to an agent when he arrested a worker named Miguel.
Aidouan tells the agent that he has already visited the car wash the day before. One agent joked about whether the previous day’s agent had been washed.
The manager said, “No. You’ve got nothing. You’re just taking our people who work hard.”
“We’re just working here. We’re not criminals,” the Aid Party says in the video.
Westchester Hand Wash was closed after two consecutive days of hits. The business requires at least 14 workers, six workers were taken, and the other workers were scared of their jobs, and they were forced to close, the Aid Party said.
He said some of the workers taken were employed in car washes for more than 20 years.
A video clip posted on social media for Magnolia Car Wash Immigration Action shows what appears to be a business manager discussing with an agent.
During the Culver City car wash, federal agents blocked both exits with the vehicle, 15-year-old Brian Vazquez said in an interview.
In the video footage, Brian screams at his agent as a sob of his 11-year-old brother. Another video clip posted on social media shows his father, Arturo Vasquez, running in panic, sitting on the sidewalk across the street, being pulled by a uniformed agent into a shirt collar.
Arturo came to wash his car with his family as a client.
The family said they had not heard from Arturo and didn’t know where he was taken until Tuesday.
“Now his sons were very hurt, and the young people couldn’t sleep,” said Lises Garcia, nie of Arturo. “I’m very heartbroken and I feel basically useless. I see my family being abused. There’s nothing we can do about it. There’s a lot of confusion and we’re all scared.”
Brian said he was volatile and angry after reading anti-immigrant comments full of hatred towards social media under clips posted from his father’s arrest.
“I want Dad back,” he said.
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