Human Impact Project

Omar Ramos Jimenez, 50, a Mexican national who has lived in Rochester since 2004 and co-founded the La Casa restaurant, was detained by ICE on Wednesday after being lured to their Buffalo field office under the pretext of installing a new reporting app. Ramos Jimenez, who has an ongoing appeal for asylum and has been complying with ICE check-ins for five years, was arrested upon arrival. His attorney filed a federal complaint alleging denial of due process and seeking his immediate release or a bond hearing.

Federal ICE agents pepper-sprayed and fired crowd suppression munitions at newly sworn-in Arizona Representative Adelita Grijalva during a confrontation with protesters outside a taco restaurant in Tucson. Video evidence shows agents spraying Grijalva and others with pepper spray and firing pepper balls, which the Department of Homeland Security denied occurred. The incident occurred during an operation targeting the restaurant as part of a human trafficking investigation, with heavily armed agents deploying flash-bang grenades, tear gas, and pepper-ball rounds at immigrant rights protesters.

Jose Argueta, a 37-year-old Maryland resident, was detained by ICE for approximately one month after D.C. police called him to pick up his recovered stolen vehicle at the Fifth District police station. According to his attorney, D.C. police coordinated with federal immigration agents to lure Argueta into custody, which violates the city's Sanctuary Values Act. The incident is under investigation by both D.C. police internal affairs and the Office of Police Complaints.

Immigration agents took a cash box from a taco stand in La Puente after arresting four people at the location, according to a witness account. The incident involved the confiscation of the business's cash box during the enforcement action.

Stephanie Velasquez, a Venezuelan woman seeking asylum, was detained by ICE on December 5th, 2025 during one of her appointments. She was married to a U.S. citizen at the time of her detention.

Francisco Paredes, a 46-year-old maintenance worker at St. Gabriel Catholic Church in Hopkins, Minnesota, was arrested by ICE on December 4, 2025, and deported to Mexico after living in the U.S. for 25 years. Paredes was detained for approximately one month in multiple facilities, including a Bloomington immigration office holding cell with 40 people, Crow Wing County Jail in Brainerd, and Webb County Detention Center in Texas, where he reported sleeping on floors without blankets and receiving minimal food. He spent Christmas imprisoned and was denied phone contact for several days after his arrest. Five weeks later, ICE agents surveilled St. Gabriel's Church during a Spanish-language Mass on January 4, 2026, which church leadership and local officials said violated parishioners' constitutional right to free exercise of religion. Francisco Paredes, a maintenance worker at St. Gabriel the Archangel Catholic Church in Hopkins, was detained by ICE agents in December 2024 after picking up coffee on his way to work. Paredes had lived in the U.S. for 25 years. He was transported to a processing facility following his detention.

Sophie Watso, a Dakota woman, was detained for more than 48 hours at Fort Snelling after encountering ICE officers while driving in Minneapolis. When she blew a whistle to alert others to federal presence, officers accused her of interference, broke her car window, and forcibly removed her from the vehicle. Fort Snelling is the same site where Dakota ancestors were imprisoned after the 1862 U.S.-Dakota War.

ICE agents arrested Julio, a man with end-stage kidney failure requiring regular dialysis, as he returned home from a medical appointment. He was held in detention facilities and denied appropriate medical care, eventually suffering a severe stroke while hospitalized under ICE surveillance. His family, all U.S. citizens including a military servicemember, advocated for his release but ICE refused despite his critical medical needs.

ICE detained a critically ill man who was traveling to receive medical treatment. Williams Javier Toro Enamorado, a 27-year-old Honduran man with end-stage kidney disease, was detained by ICE agents on November 19 while traveling to a dialysis appointment during an operation called "Charlotte's Web." He claims he was denied dialysis treatment and pressured to sign a voluntary deportation order, with officers allegedly telling him "If you want to leave, sign. If not, you're going to die here." He is being held at an ICE detention center in Folkston, Georgia, over 360 miles from his family in North Carolina.

Omar Ramos Jimenez, a 50-year-old restaurant founder and community leader, was detained by ICE in December 2025 during a check-in appointment and has remained held at a federal detention facility in Batavia. A federal judge denied his requests for release and bond hearing in February 2026. Ramos Jimenez, who has lived in Rochester since 2004 and is originally from Mexico, is seeking asylum and appealing the denial of his release petition.

Victor Peralta Perez, a Venezuelan electrician with a pending asylum case and no criminal record, was detained by ICE on December 4, 2025, during a mandatory annual immigration check-in in Dallas. He was held for more than 100 days, transferred among facilities including Bluebonnet, Eden, Fort Bliss, and Florence, where he reported mold, contaminated food and water, and inadequate medical care. His wife, Madison Crider, said neither of them was ever given a clear explanation for his detention, and the couple's U.S.-citizen twin infants have not seen their father in the six months since. He was granted voluntary departure by an immigration judge on February 12, 2026, and left the United States on February 28, 2026 (according to DHS) or March 3, 2026 (according to his wife), citing the detention conditions and uncertain timeline.

Federal ICE agents arrested a U.S. citizen Somali woman born in Edina near Nicollet Mall in downtown Minneapolis on Wednesday. According to her cousin, agents zip-tied her, mocked her hijab, and touched her inappropriately before taking her to Sherburne County Jail in Elk River. She was released Thursday after more than 24 hours in custody once her husband provided her passport card proving her citizenship.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents detained an American citizen woman during an immigration enforcement traffic stop near mile marker 103 in Key Largo on Wednesday morning. Video footage shows agents forcefully removing the woman from her vehicle, wrestling her to the ground, and handcuffing her after discovering her boyfriend was in the country illegally. The woman, who was wearing medical scrubs, was released approximately 10 minutes later after agents verified her U.S. citizenship through her driver's license. The operation resulted in 14 undocumented immigrants being arrested for deportation proceedings. The incident was recorded by a Miami Herald reporter.

Lucia Webb, a 31-year-old Minneapolis resident, followed two ICE vehicles to the park-and-ride outside the Whipple Building on December 3. Officers boxed her in, surrounded her car, and threatened to arrest her. She is a named plaintiff in an ACLU lawsuit alleging ICE violated constitutional rights of observers and protesters.

An asylum seeker from Ecuador who fled extortion and death threats was detained by ICE on December 3, 2025 during a routine check-in at 630 Sansome Street in San Francisco. Despite having no criminal record and consistently appearing for immigration hearings, ICE alleged she missed a July 23, 2025 check-in that was not visible on her application. The court granted a temporary restraining order requiring her immediate release and prohibiting re-detention without a pre-deprivation hearing.

Francisco Gaspar Cristóbal Andrés, 48, died on December 3, 2025, after 93 days in ICE detention, becoming the first known detainee death at the Camp East Montana facility in El Paso, the nation's largest immigration detention center. He had worked in the U.S. for 20 years and was married to Lucía Pedro Juan for 25 years, with five children. Guards separated the couple during processing and ordered them not to touch, and weeks later Pedro Juan was deported to Guatemala despite pleading to see her husband, who was hospitalized in grave condition with liver and kidney complications; she learned of his death after returning to her hometown of Santa Eulalia. Detainees at the facility reported verbal abuse by guards, including derogatory remarks and claims they were served dog food.

A behavioral therapist for children in Key Largo, Florida, was stopped by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents on December 3 while driving to work in a car registered to her partner, who is undocumented. Body camera and cellphone video, recorded in part by a Miami Herald reporter, showed agents unlocking her door, dragging her from the vehicle, taking her phone, and handcuffing her as she screamed, "I'm a U.S. citizen, please help me! This is unfair. Why are you doing this to me?" The woman, described as just under 5 feet tall and 85 pounds, said agents searched her purse without consent and that she complied by rolling down her window as instructed. She was held for about 10 minutes before being released once agents confirmed her citizenship through her driver's license. She said this was the third time she had been stopped in the same area for an immigration inspection, and that the experience left her unable to sleep, in physical pain, and emotionally traumatized. U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz said the incident reflected a pattern of people being "racially profiled by ICE," and protesters later gathered in Islamorada to demand accountability. Her case is one of more than 500 documented by ProPublica involving U.S. citizens detained by immigration agents during the Trump administration.

Federal agents, including more than 200 CBP and ICE officials led by Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino, carried out the 'Catahoula Crunch' operation in New Orleans and Kenner beginning December 3, 2025, lasting several weeks and resulting in 560 arrests, the vast majority of people detained having no criminal records. The raids slowed business at Hispanic-owned stores and reduced attendance at some schools and churches, after agents arrested people fleeing a Lowe's parking lot, patrolled a heavily Hispanic neighborhood, and surrounded a home during a standoff. On January 26, 2026, U.S. House Democrats held a hearing at New Orleans City Hall where Mayor Helena Moreno and other officials testified that fear persists among immigrants, saying agents had targeted predominantly Hispanic groups before identifying individuals. The hearing also referenced the recent fatal shooting of a Minneapolis nurse by Border Patrol agents, which lawmakers said reflected similar enforcement tactics.

Federal immigration agents stopped a woman driving in Key Largo and forcibly removed her from her vehicle despite her stating she was a U.S. citizen. After agents pulled her from the car and handcuffed her, they found her driver's license in the vehicle and confirmed through their system that she is a U.S. citizen. She was released shortly after.

A 23-year-old U.S. citizen mother was chased by Border Patrol agents near her home in Marrero while walking from a store on Wednesday. The encounter was captured on video and occurred during an enforcement operation called "Catahoula Crunch" in the New Orleans area. The woman told agents twice that she was an American citizen before running into her parents' home, where agents stood outside for several minutes.