Immigration officials detain US citizen siblings in Mission Bay
Officials held the two siblings at the federal building basement for most of the day before releasing them to their father.
Written by Kate Morrissey, Edited by Lauren J. Mapp
Immigration officials arrested two U.S. citizens while they were parked in a Mission Bay lot in the final days of December, according to the two detained siblings and their father.
The pair spent most of the day in the basement of the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Building in downtown San Diego before an official called their father to go pick them up, they said. The family believes it was a case of racial profiling.
“I thought they were being kidnapped,” said Manuel, the father, who said he saw his adult children taken away by men in plainclothes.
The family members asked to use only part of their names to protect themselves from other potential attacks.
The Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to requests for comment. The U.S. Attorney's Office in San Diego declined to comment and deferred to ICE.
Manuel, 64, and his two children had just finished reading their morning scripture sitting in his car parked in a lot in the Mission Bay neighborhood around 7 a.m., as they do most mornings, when he noticed SUVs with tinted windows pulling up behind him, Manuel said.
Ruben, 34, was sitting with his door open. Ruben said two men, who had nothing on them to identify them as officers, pulled him from the car and threw him on the ground. He said he landed face down with his arms splayed on the pavement of the adjacent parking space.
He said the men got on top of him, and he felt a knee hitting against the back of his head.
“I don't know why they were doing that,” Ruben said. “I wasn't coming at them combative in any way.”
He still had scrapes on his knees that he said were from the officials when Daylight spoke with him in early January.
His sister, Maria, 36, said she saw what the men were doing to her brother and got out of the car to try to help him.
“They were all piling on him,” she said.
The men put her down on the ground, too. The siblings ended up in handcuffs in separate SUVs, they said.
The family believes that some of the people who park or live in their cars in the area may have witnessed what happened, but so far they haven't found anyone to share video with them, Manuel said.
Manuel tried to get information from the men, but all he learned is that there was an investigation underway, he said. He said he felt intimidated by the guns he saw the men carrying, but he told one of them that his children were U.S. citizens, that their family had roots in Alabama.
The man told Manuel that he was from Huntsville, Manuel recalled, and that Manuel's children would be taken downtown.
“They came like the mob and kidnapped them,” Manuel said. “It was messed up. It kind of messed up my head a little bit.”
Worried, Manuel went downtown to try to find his children, first asking at the federal jail and then around the federal building, he said. He met some of the volunteers who accompany immigrants to their court hearings and immigration appointments, he said.
Later that day, Manuel received a phone call from a man who said his name was John and that he worked for the Department of Homeland Security, Manuel said.
Manuel said John asked him about what happened but hung up when Manuel asked for his last name. That afternoon, Manuel received another call to go pick up his children from the federal building, he said.
Daylight called the number that John had used to call Manuel, and a man who identified himself as John answered. When Daylight began to ask him questions, the call disconnected. Further attempts to call the number went to a generic voicemail.
The family still parks in the lot most days. Manuel called the parking lot his home away from home.
“With me, whatever happens, happens — maybe it's the age I'm at,” Manuel said. “But I know as a citizen, we've got rights.”
