A woman was detained by federal immigration agents in Cypress Park on Tuesday, part of ongoing enforcement operations in the L.A. region.
In a video obtained by Boyle Heights Beat, masked men in jeans, T-shirts, and caps and wearing green military-style vests, can be seen surrounding a Toyota van with two women inside, one in the driver’s seat and the other in the passenger’s seat. Witnesses can be heard demanding to see a warrant, but none was presented, according to witnesses at the scene.
The video was captured by a witness shortly before noon near Avenue 28 and Pepper Avenue, according to the Boyle Heights Immigrants Rights Network, which identified the agents as being from Border Patrol.
“Which agents are you?” one person can be heard saying in the video. “Can we see the warrant you have with her name?” another asks.
An agent wearing a backwards Dodgers cap tells a bystander, “Get back. Don’t get closer.”
Another agent is seen talking to the woman sitting in the passenger’s seat with the door open, while other agents surround the van as they stand on the sidewalk and next to a truck and SUV. “This case concerns her, not you or anybody else,” the agent is heard telling a man.
The woman was taken to the Metropolitan Detention Center, according to Raquel Roman, executive director of Proyecto Pastoral, which operates the Boyle Heights Immigrant Rights Network.
“People need to stay vigilant. People believe there’s protection, but there isn’t. They don’t have warrants and they are profiling,” Roman said.
The operation comes despite a court order banning federal agents from conducting detention stops without “reasonable suspicion” that individuals are violating U.S. immigration law.