A California man whose family said he was a U.S. citizen was hospitalized in Long Beach over the weekend after an altercation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement left him pinned to the ground in handcuffs.
The encounter in Southern California on Saturday is the latest mistaken detainment as ICE arrest numbers across the country continue to rise.
It was unclear on Monday what led to the encounter, how it unfolded or whether the man was still in the hospital. But officers with the Long Beach Police Department arrived at the scene after being called in for backup by ICE, which reported that vehicles were being vandalized and that there was a person “in need of medical attention,” according to a statement from the police.
Officers then took a bleeding, handcuffed man to a nearby fire station, where they removed his handcuffs and later took him to a hospital, the statement said. The police said they were not involved in immigration enforcement and did not make any arrests at the scene.
The police declined to further comment and directed questions to the Department of Homeland Security, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The man, Ricardo Gonzalez, was riding an e-bike when he was struck by an unmarked vehicle, according to Leslie Gonzalez, his daughter, in a post on Instagram. She said in a message to The New York Times that her father was a U.S. citizen but declined to answer more questions, citing concerns for her family’s safety. But in her post, Ms. Gonzalez wrote that her father had been “tased” and pinned to the ground. Mr. Gonzalez did not respond to an interview request.
In clips posted to social media, Mr. Gonzalez appears immobilized on his stomach by officers wearing ICE vests.
“My arm is broken, stop!” he yells, asking for medical assistance as officers handcuff him, restraining his arms behind his back.
Mr. Gonzalez is one of many U.S. citizens who have been mistakenly detained by federal immigration agents in operations that are part of the Trump administration’s deportation campaign.
In September, agents held a U.S. citizen in suburban Chicago. The man suffered injuries to his head, neck and teeth in the confrontation. This month, ProPublica reported that hundreds of U.S. citizens have been detained by immigration officers under the current administration, inadvertently caught up in federal operations. (During President Trump’s first term, a U.S. citizen was awarded a $55,000 settlement after she was wrongfully detained by ICE.)
There has also been a recent spike in ICE arrests of people with no criminal record even as Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin continues to emphasize that the agency is targeting “the worst of the worst.”
In Long Beach, videos of the encounter involving Mr. Gonzalez show a chaotic scene on a neighborhood street, with onlookers yelling at law enforcement. In other clips, a woman is shown being handcuffed by ICE officers and put in a car.
“That’s my wife, and that’s a U.S. citizen,” a man is seen yelling in one of the videos, using expletives.
Mayor Rex Richardson of Long Beach said that he had spoken to Mr. Gonzalez on Sunday but that he did not have information about the woman in the other videos.
Mr. Gonzalez had called 911 on Saturday, the mayor said, adding he did not have details about how the altercation unfolded.
By the time police officers arrived, Mr. Gonzalez was being detained, Mr. Richardson said. The mayor’s team was still gathering documentation from Saturday and working to verify what happened. His office plans to submit a complaint to D.H.S., he added.
“This is his neighborhood. He’s a father, he’s a dad,” Mr. Richardson said of Mr. Gonzalez. “The reality is, you know, that wasn’t what he expected that day. He didn’t expect that his children were going to see him cuffed and on the curb. He simply just wants his kids to be safe,” the mayor added.
On Instagram, Mr. Richardson wrote that ICE did not belong in his city and that the agency’s activities had undermined community safety.
Mr. Richardson added that his team was concerned about the timing as California begins early voting.
“No one should feel intimidated or afraid to exercise their right to vote,” he said.
Kitty Bennett contributed research.
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