Andrea Veres, a US citizen who was detained by federal agents earlier this week, spoke out on Thursday after being released on bonds.
Velez, 32, was taken into custody during immigration enforcement work in downtown Los Angeles. The Department of Homeland Security said Veles was “forcibly obstructing an ice officer” and was charged with assaulting a federal officer.
After being released from federal jail in downtown, Veres says he is unaware of her efforts to drive her out.
“I want to be safe and thank everyone who is catching up to me, and I’m grateful to my family because I didn’t know they were doing all this,” said Veres, who couldn’t do it for her mom and sister.
Estrella Rosas recorded a desperate moment when she saw her sister being arrested by an unidentified police officer near 9th Avenue and Main Street and thrown into the ground before being forced into an unmarked car.
Andrea Veres was released on bonds Thursday after being detained by federal agents in downtown Los Angeles during immigration enforcement work. The video aired on NBC4 News at 6pm on June 26, 2025.
Speaking about the event on Tuesday, Velez says she’s still handling it all.
“It all happened so fast, so yeah, they didn’t identify themselves, so I was kind of scared,” Veles said. “I was just scared. I didn’t know what was going to happen. I didn’t know where I was going.
Veres says that after she was placed in an unmarked car, agents began to question her citizenship and tried to speak to her in Spanish. She added that she felt “racially profiled” as a Latina.
In the criminal charges, prosecutors alleged that during immigration enforcement Tuesday morning, “Veres stepped into the board’s path and spread one of her arms in an obvious effort to prevent him from arresting the male subject he was chasing, and Berez’s extended arm attacked the officer.”
On a court appearance Thursday, Veres was not in the federal court petition. Velez’s family said they were walking along the way as a marketing designer and nothing wrong.
“Andrea was a victim of excessive use of force by federal agents, and they had no right to stop her, and they had no right to defeat her. What you’re seeing on the video is police brutality,” said Luis Carillo, Beres’ lawyer.
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