Human Impact Project

A Danbury, Connecticut construction worker, identified by family as Edel Hernandez Cervantes, was tackled, kicked, and repeatedly tased by ICE agents on August 27, 2026, after he and coworkers noticed an ICE vehicle following them on their way to a job site and turned back home. Neighbors' video and a 911 call showed as many as five agents surrounding the vehicle, pinning him face-down, and shocking him with a Taser while he complained of hypertension and was reported to be convulsing. Family described him as an expert baker who once owned a bakery in Mexico known for bread made for Día de los Muertos and Three Kings Day, and who always kept the radio on and loved to sing. He was taken by ambulance to Danbury Hospital, where staff and ICE denied his family and an attorney access to him, telling them there was no record of him as a patient. Danbury Mayor Roberto Alves said he had already been transferred to ICE custody in Hartford before officials could intervene, and his whereabouts and condition remained unclear for days afterward.

Julio Borrell, a 72-year-old Cuban mechanic who arrived in Florida during the 1980 Mariel boatlift, was arrested during a routine immigration check-in last December after 46 years of never missing an appointment. He was held about four months at the Florida detention facility known as "Alligator Alcatraz," transferred to a processing site in Eloy, Arizona, and then bused nearly two days to Tapachula, Mexico — a city he said he had never heard of, more than 1,100 miles from the nearest U.S. border crossing. Now surviving by patching tires on the street and saving for a room to rent, Borrell is the father of seven U.S.-born children, eleven grandchildren and a great-grandchild whom he can only reach by borrowed phone; he told his daughter, "I won't die in Tapachula." His case is part of a broader U.S. practice, tied to Mexico's Interior Repatriation Programme, of flying deportees far from the border into remote interior cities like Tapachula and Villahermosa.

Venkata Vasamsetty, a 59-year-old green card holder who moved to the U.S. from India in 1999, works as a special-needs substitute teacher with Wake County Public School System in Cary, North Carolina, and is a grandmother with a husband, two U.S.-citizen daughters, and grandchildren. Her immigration troubles began after a 2022 trip to India to care for her ill father, during which she contracted COVID-19 and remained abroad for more than seven months, prompting DHS to allege she had abandoned her permanent residency. An immigration judge dismissed that case in May after DHS missed a court deadline, but she was detained anyway during a check-in at the Charlotte ICE office her attorney said she was not legally required to attend, and was transferred to the Irwin County Detention Center in rural Georgia. Her daughter Teja, an immigration attorney, said she was shackled during the arrest while family pleaded with officers. Family and her attorney, Helen Parsonage, said her type 2 diabetes worsened in custody, with low blood sugar, weight loss, and the facility largely ignoring requests for an adequate vegetarian diet respecting her Hindu dietary restrictions. After more than two weeks in detention, an immigration judge in Georgia granted her release on a $7,500 bond, citing her long-standing U.S. ties, a home, tax returns dating back to 2012, her teaching job, and her history of never missing a court appearance or check-in.

Juan Miguel Aldape, a longtime Newberg, Oregon resident of 22 years and devout Catholic, was detained by masked federal immigration agents without a warrant while buying materials for a construction job at a Lowe's parking lot in McMinnville. Family describe him as a taxpayer, primary caregiver for his youngest son who has autism, and a grandfather whose young grandchildren ask for their 'Papa Juan' daily. He was transferred through an ICE processing center in Portland, then the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, and ultimately to the Richwood Correctional Center in Louisiana. His family was unable to reach him for over a week and struggled to find him legal representation, while ICE confirmed he is from Mexico and described the arrest as part of a 'targeted enforcement operation.' Advocates from Innovation Law Lab and relatives say the warrantless arrest violated a February federal court order barring such ICE arrests in Oregon; his daughter-in-law Ashleen Aldape spoke publicly about the family's ordeal at a community press conference organized by the nonprofit Unidos Bridging Community.

Marianita, a woman held in ICE detention, said sickness spread among detainees while her requests for medical care were ignored. She described being soaked with cold water, forced to dry off in front of an air conditioner, and later confined in a freezing punishment room as her pneumonia worsened. She was transferred through ICE facilities in Florida, Louisiana, and Texas during her detention.

A Colombian mother was separated from her two young children during a routine ICE check-in in Baltimore, despite an immigration judge having ruled she would likely face torture or persecution if deported to Colombia. She was transferred to the Eloy Detention Center in Arizona and remained in ICE custody for months afterward. An Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting analysis identified her as one of more than 120 immigrants in Arizona whom ICE continued to detain even after judges had barred their deportation to their home countries due to humanitarian protections.

A., a 45-year-old Venezuelan man who worked in the wind energy sector and held withholding of removal protection, was detained by ICE at a routine immigration check-in earlier in 2026 while his wife, who had the same protection, was released. He was transferred through four detention centers, suffered severe anxiety and depression, and was chained hand and foot during the roughly 15-hour deportation flight to Liberia. His daughter has been in therapy since his deportation, and he fears ICE will also detain his wife, leaving his children without either parent in the United States.

Eduardo José Osal Mujica, 32, crossed the Darién Gap into the U.S., turned himself in to immigration authorities, and applied for asylum while working installing roofs and driving for Uber, settling first in Denver and later Wyoming. Local police detained him during a traffic stop in Wyoming, after which he was transferred through detention facilities in Colorado, Arizona and Texas before signing a deportation order. He was among 146 Venezuelans deported on Flight 164, which landed in Maiquetía, Venezuela on June 24, after which he and other deportees were taken to the Negra Hipólita Health Hotel for medical checkups before planned release to their home cities. The hotel collapsed in an earthquake that day, killing an unknown number of deportees while in Venezuelan custody. His wife, Danielys Hurtado, spent five days searching for his body among bags of corpses at an improvised morgue in a converted grain-storage facility. Nearly two months later, the Venezuelan government has released no official information on those who died, with survivor estimates ranging between 12 and 32.

Beaubrun Charles Ardouin, a naturalized U.S. citizen who drives for a transportation company shuttling workers, was pulled over near Topre America in Springfield, Ohio, in what DHS called a 'targeted enforcement' stop. Ardouin said he showed officers his ID and told them he was a citizen, but they demanded identification from his five Haitian passengers and threatened to break his van's windows if he didn't unlock them. All five men, who said they had pending asylum applications, were detained and booked into Butler County Jail under ICE holds; jail records identified them as Canot Monnimat, Albert Francois, Nero Adrien Toussaint, Cadet Vixama and Wislain Fenelon. The stop occurred amid broader ICE activity across Springfield, including arrests near a car wash in an area with several Haitian-owned businesses, with some detainees' mugshots showing them still in work uniforms. Butler County Jail held 17 people listing Haiti as their birth country under ICE detention as of one recent Monday, as many of Springfield's estimated 10,000 to 15,000 Haitian residents became vulnerable to detention after a federal judge lifted a stay on the revocation of Temporary Protected Status for Haiti. Legal experts questioned whether officers had reasonable suspicion for the traffic stop, and DHS said several of the detained men have since been released or transferred.

Marcos Gaspar-Da Silva, a general contractor and former attorney from Brazil living in Bridgton, Maine, was detained by ICE on January 20 after being pulled over in Portland during an enforcement operation. He had a pending asylum case, no criminal record, and a marriage-based green card petition filed by his U.S. citizen wife, Alessia. Over nearly seven months in custody, he was transferred through facilities in Massachusetts, Louisiana and Arizona, where he and his wife described overcrowding, unsanitary conditions and inadequate medical care, including going untreated for a toothache until the tooth was pulled and losing more than 26 pounds. U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree's staff supported Alessia and helped expedite his petition while pressing officials about his medical care. In August, an immigration judge granted him adjustment of status to lawful permanent resident through his wife's petition, and he was released on August 13, reuniting with his wife and 11-year-old daughter, though he described lasting emotional numbness and difficulty eating and sleeping.

A man was taken into ICE custody on August 14, 2026 and held at the Northwest ICE Processing Center (NWIPC) in Tacoma, Washington. Proceeding pro se, he filed a habeas corpus petition on August 26, 2026, and the court ordered that he be given seven days' notice before any transfer out of the district. The next day, however, ICE transferred him to a facility in Richwood, Louisiana in violation of that order. After a relative alerted the court to the transfer, ICE made four failed attempts between August 31 and September 4, 2026 to fly him back to Tacoma before he was finally returned to NWIPC on September 8, 2026. He then filed an emergency motion alleging he was subjected to severe physical cruelty while away and that his mother suffered a cardiac emergency due to the stress of his disappearance, seeking proof of life, an independent medical evaluation, and release, as well as appointment of counsel. The court denied both motions, finding he failed to address the required legal factors for a TRO, that conditions-of-confinement claims cannot be raised in a habeas petition, and that he had not shown financial eligibility for appointed counsel.

Maureen Wanjiru Ngure, a Kenyan-born nurse who worked in Bay Area hospitals for eight years and volunteered with the Contra Costa County Covid Team, was detained during a mandated ICE appointment in San Francisco on August 14, 2026. She had never missed a DHS appointment in 20 years in the U.S., and her husband and two young children are U.S. citizens. She was served a third-country deportation order and transferred through detention centers in California, Arizona, and Louisiana, sleeping on floors and losing her ID, phone, and wallet in the process. She was driven to an airport for deportation to an unnamed country before a last-minute halt returned her to Richwood Detention Center in Monroe, Louisiana. Her family later confirmed she was ultimately deported to Kenya, a country she had not lived in for two decades.

A man was arrested by ICE agents outside his family's home in Florida moments after dropping his younger son off for soccer practice. He was held at the Miramar GSA ICE Processing Center for about 96 hours, with roughly 67 hours passing without any contact with his family, before being transferred to the Broward Transitional Center. Despite his family submitting over 200 pages of documentation, including community testimonies and 20 years of tax records showing no criminal history after more than 25 years in the U.S., his bond was denied on flight-risk grounds. He was then transferred again, traveling more than 27 hours with his hands and feet restrained to the Rio Grande Detention Center in Texas, during which he was fed only about twice. His family describes him as a husband of over 28 years, a father of two, a taxpayer, a maintenance supervisor, and a soccer coach, and is now pursuing a bond redetermination.

Adonys Francisco Mata Martinez, a Venezuelan freestyle rapper known as AdonysX who held Temporary Protected Status and had a pending extraordinary-talent artist visa application, was detained by ICE in late May after a traffic stop in Florida in which officers found no violation but identified his immigration status via his license plate. He said, 'We are not criminals for them to treat us this way,' describing five days sleeping on the floor at a Miramar processing center without the ability to bathe, followed by about a month at Krome Detention Center before being transferred with roughly 50 others to a facility in Louisiana. There, he said he works in the kitchen for one dollar a day amid cockroaches and insects, and reported chest pains dismissed as anxiety and a dental nerve problem he tried to self-treat after being denied a dentist. Nearly three months into his Louisiana detention, with his immigration court hearing repeatedly delayed by continuances, he alleged staff are overcrowding detainees—citing 76 people in a single cell—and reported widespread cases of tuberculosis and pink eye, saying in Spanish, 'They're trying to kill us.' ICE denied the allegations, stating that being in detention is a choice.

Daniela lost her three-month pregnancy while in immigration detention custody. She was transferred between detention facilities across multiple U.S. states over nearly four months and reports she did not receive appropriate medical treatment for her pregnancy while detained.

On August 10, 2026, ICE agents detained at least 33 people across the Capital Region of New York, including Albany, Schenectady, and Colonie, in more than 15 separate incidents over roughly six hours. Among those detained was a family of four, including two children, who were separated and sent to two different detention facilities, with one family member transferred to the Dilley Detention Center in Texas. The Capital Region Sanctuary Coalition, which documented the incidents, said the true number detained may be higher since ICE was also seen patrolling additional neighborhoods that day.

Iliana Noeli Lick, 30, an Argentine national who legally entered the U.S. on a tourist visa and was awaiting an asylum interview with USCIS, was arrested by ICE at Philadelphia International Airport on July 11 while attempting to travel to Kansas City to watch the Argentina national team play in the World Cup quarterfinal. Lick has worked as a nanny caring for three young children in South Philadelphia for two years and has no criminal record. She was transferred between multiple ICE detention facilities in Pennsylvania, Louisiana, Texas, and New Mexico, where she was held with nine others in a small cell with one window and one toilet. After one month in custody, Lick was released on a $10,000 bond and required to surrender her passport and license and wear an ankle monitor. She is awaiting a court date to determine whether she will be deported or allowed to remain in the country.

A Ravenswood parent was detained by immigration in July in front of their family's home and transferred to an out-of-state detention facility. The family, facing constant stress and fear of ICE involvement, decided to self-deport together rather than pursue an uncertain legal path and risk lengthy detention. An attorney is representing the family through the self-deportation process to ensure they are treated fairly and arrive together in their destination country.

Jack Chung, a lawful permanent resident and asylee who fled China after participating in pro-democracy protests, was taken into ICE custody on August 8 following what his family describes as a retaliatory report from a business associate. Chung, a father of three including a newborn, was transferred through Washington State and Virginia before being detained at a facility in Natchez, Mississippi, thousands of miles from his wife and children in Alaska. His wife Mojo is now caring for their newborn and two young sons alone in Alaska without his income, and the family is raising money for legal representation to fight the detention.

Marco Uriel Rodriguez Hernandez, an immigration detainee, had won a finding that the government was unlawfully denying him a bond hearing. He was then transferred out of the privately run Aurora detention center to an unknown location and later found to be held in Texas. After his attorney, Skylar M. Larson, filed a new habeas petition, Colorado's Chief Federal Judge Daniel D. Domenico issued a temporary restraining order barring ICE from removing him, and the order was emailed to federal prosecutors. Despite this, ICE deported Rodriguez Hernandez to Mexico the following morning without allowing him to contact his attorney. Government attorneys said officials in Texas who carried out the removal were unaware of the court's order and said they 'greatly regret the error.' Domenico ordered the government to take all available steps to facilitate his return to the United States.