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Adrian Martinez, a 20-year-old Walmart employee, returned from a break Tuesday when he saw workers keeping workers cleaning the parking lot at a shopping centre in Pico Rivera. He ran out of the car and moved the man’s trash can in front of the car as other passersby gathered around the truck, screaming and yelling at the corner.
Videos of surveillance and audiences shot in the scene and looped over social media feeds show agents rushing Martinez to the ground. He gets up and is pushed further, exchanging angry words with the masked officer carrying the rifle before the other agents swarm him and push him back before dragging him into the truck.
“What is he doing? He’s AF – hardworking,” Martinez can hear more agents scream as they arrive.
Bill Essayli, the top LA prosecutor, posted to X that Martinez was “arrested on allegations of punching Border Patrol agents in the face after attempting to thwart immigration enforcement activities.”
The suspected punching was not clear in the video footage. You can hear the agent thrust Martinez into the car and scream, “He’s a US citizen, a brother.” In the confrontation video, agents are seen and heard covering their guns, as if others were fighting Martinez.
Martinez is one of a handful of American citizens who have been attracting widespread attention for the past two weeks when arrests or detention by immigration officers have been gaining widespread attention.
Earlier this month, the essays accused union leader David Fuerta of the plot to thwart officials after an encounter in a downtown Los Angeles attack. A pregnant woman in Torrance was detained after standing between the car carrying her agent and her husband. Also, in Montebello, less than three miles since Tuesday’s incident, Border Patrol agents last week arrested Javier Ramirez, a US citizen who worked in the tow yard. They also custodyed and questioned another US citizen, Brian Gavidia, and pushed him onto the fence when they asked him what hospital he was born in.
The conflict added to tensions in the predominantly Latinos enclaves in Los Angeles County, where federal agents are mostly raids. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees immigration and customs enforcement and US customs border security, says its officers are increasingly under threat while trying to enforce the law.
Many in the community see it as a moral obligation to push it back.
Martinez’s mom, Myra Villarial, said she wasn’t surprised that her son tried to help. He often brings in stray animals that need homes.
“If anyone gets injured, he wants to be the first person there,” said his sister Samantha Villarreal.
“I want justice for him,” his mom added. “It’s wrong what happened to him. He didn’t do anything wrong. I believed he was talking. Everyone has the right to speak. You know, free speech.”
She said she couldn’t find Martinez for a few hours after her arrest. Around midnight, she finally confirmed that he was in custody downtown. She told him on a Wednesday afternoon.
In a statement to the Times, Customs and Border Patrol said the video “lacks key moments and doesn’t tell the entire story.”
The Border Patrol agents commanding the “roving patrol” arrested undocumented immigrants at the same plaza’s Row store, which “has been faced by hostile groups trying to interfere in their duties,” the statement said.
It is said that an agent was punched in the face and another agent was hit in the arm by a member of the group. The statement said the lawsuit against Martinez was filed with the US Lawyer’s Office for the prosecution to obstruct or assault a federal officer. As of Wednesday night there were no complaints.
“DHS and partner agent agents and officers continue to face hostile groups that hinder their ability to perform their duties,” the statement read. “This interference puts the people, agents and communities who have been arrested at risk. Obstructing federal law enforcement is a crime and a felony.
US Border Patrol Chief Greg Bovino has doubled hundreds of agents sweeping in Southern California.
“I want justice for him,” Myra Villarial said of her son. “What happened to him is wrong.”
(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)
“One more, the arrest of a US citizen was pushing out a false story,” he wrote to X. “Please don’t take our words,” he said, linking to the essay post. “This subject filed a federal lawsuit for assaulting a federal agent. Please don’t assault.”
Oscar Preciad, who was on the scene and recorded the video, pushed back the allegations and said, “They are trying to spin this and make it look like that.” [Martinez] When they were invaders all along, they were invaders. ”
In the Montebello attack, Ramirez was charged with assault, resistance and obstruction of a federal officer in federal criminal charges. Authorities claimed he was trying to hide himself, then ran towards the exit of the tow yard and refused to answer questions about his identity and citizenship. They also claim that he pushed and bitten the agent.
His lawyer, Thomas de Jesus, denied the allegation, stating that Ramirez was “a victim, not an invader.”
Targeted city officials are holding flags about agent tactics.
Montebello Mayor Salvador Melendez said he saw a video showing another US citizen being questioned and calling the situation “very frustrating.”
“It doesn’t seem to be a legitimate procedure,” he said. “They want a particular look that is what our Latino, the immigrant community looks, and they have been asking questions since.
Regional representatives, General Linda T. Sanchez (D-Whittier) and Ice Acting Director Todd Lyons, Todd Lyons, said there were “significant concerns about Martinez’s arrest and detention.” She said the case appears to have violated Civil Rights Act.
“I am deeply troubled by the fact that US citizens who support their families by working at Walmart are respectable members of his community and continue to be detained by the federal government on all accounts,” she writes.
She requested that they provide planning documents and warrants and review agencies and staff related to “Hernandez’s violent arrest and unconstitutional detention.”
Pico Rivera Mayor Steve Carmona said in a statement Tuesday: “We are increasingly concerned about the nature and tone of these recent actions. The growing enforcement tactics and reports of operations that appear to be targeting specific communities raise serious concerns about proportionality, equity and due process.”
The video induces anger and highlights the increasing upset on both sides. Immigration advocates chase agents from neighborhood to neighborhood. The app has pop-up. Nextdoor and Ring Blare raid warning neighbors. Crowds and livestreamers gather when they spot unpublished immigration operations on the streets.
Dozens of people, including Martinez’s friends, gathered in Pico Rivera on Tuesday night to protest immigration behaviour. They chanted “Ice from Pico” and waved the Mexican and American flags.
Preciado, a 33-year-old Instacart worker, filmed a video of the brawl in the parking lot Tuesday morning. He ran towards the scene after seeing the fuss with three boundary patrol trucks and three unmarked vehicles.
In his video, Preciado questions and curses the agent as the others arrive and jumps off a truck that is not marked with a rifle.
“You can hear one of the guys cock a gun… and he pointed it at us and told us to run away,” Preciad said.
By then, several masked agents with guns (with camouflage, some plain clothes) had been in custody of Vivaldo Montes Herrera, whom Martinez tried to protect.
According to his wife, Montes Herrera has lived in the United States for 27 years.
Preciado said the agent grabbed him and placed his hand on his neck.
“That’s what I told him, I’m a US citizen and I’m exercising my right to record,” Preciad said. “That’s when the guy hits the phone out of my hand.”
The video shows his phone being knocked on the ground. Preciado said his screen protector was crushed from the impact.
He immediately said that four or five people had worked on the ground to Martinez.
“The guy weighs 100 pounds. Maybe he doesn’t need five people to work on him and do everything to him,” Preciad said. “You can see them twist his arms, grab him by his neck and ride him on top of him.
“This is not normal. This is not normal at all,” he said. “These people are armed and dressed as if they were going to war, American citizens, people who are just trying to do their jobs.”
Monte Herrera with her daughter.
(Claudia Mejia)
On Wednesday, Montes Herrera’s wife, Claudia Mezia, said she still doesn’t know where her husband is being held. He was able to call her for a short time after his arrest.
“My agaro migratory bird,” he told her.
Usually, when he returned home to South LA from his shift around 3pm, his daughter was excitedly waiting for him to greet him at the door. He did not arrive.
On Wednesday, the girl cried out in the background as her husband described him as a hardworking worker dedicated to his work and our home.
Her husband, the father of doting, was often the one who put the baby to bed. With him gone, his wife said that she could place one of his shirts on the baby’s pillow and that the little girl could fall asleep with him.
“That’s why she knows her father is there,” Mezia said. “Tell me, what he did, it was so bad that they took him along to them.”
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