On July 2, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its sub-agency, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE):  

The Trump administration claims this is a crackdown on “the worst of the worst.” But according to the ACLU lawsuit the majority of those “stopped and arrested in the raids have not been targeted in any meaningful sense of the word at all, except on the basis of their skin color and occupation.

“Those who have borne the brunt of Defendants’ heavy-handed pattern of unlawful conduct include day laborers, car wash workers, farm workers, street vendors, service workers, caregivers and others who form the lifeblood of communities across Southern California.

“Over a thousand residents in [Los Angeles] have already been impacted, including a shocking (though hardly surprising) number of U.S. citizens and individuals lawfully present in the country.”

On May 2, Florida Highway Patrol officers and Border Patrol agents stopped 18-year-old landscaper Kenny Laynez and three coworkers—one of them his mother—as they drove past luxury buildings to a job in Palm Beach County.

An officer rolled down a tinted window and signaled to his mother—who was driving—to pull over. The officer asked where they were headed. Laynez said they were going to work and the officer took his mother’s license and the truck’s registration and insurance.

The officer returned and said his mother’s license was suspended.

The officer asked if they were “illegal.”

Laynez said they were not, although two of his co-workers—Esdras and Marroquin—were, and asked what that had to do with the license.

A van pulled up and more armed agents swarmed the truck. A female officer approached his window and ordered them in Spanish to shut off their phones.

Instead, Laynez—assuming that something ominous was going to happen—started recording with his phone: 

OFFICER (in Spanish): Who in here is illegal? Whoever takes longer to answer will get more charges and spend more time in jail.

One of the co-workers—Esdras—raised his hand.  

A male officer ordered them to open the door.

LAYNEZ: Wait, hold up. You don’t have the right to do that.

OFFICER (laughing): I don’t have a right?

He reached inside the car and opened the door. An agent grabbed Esdras by the hair and placed his neck in the crook of his arm.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents

Another agent pulled Marroquin out by the leg and tightened his hands around his neck.

Laynez stepped out of the car, but an officer who had ordered him to get on the ground pushed him from behind, twisted his arms and forced him to kneel on the pavement.

Esdras stood rigidly as three officers tried to force him to the ground. They told him in English to lie down, while Laynez urged him in Spanish not to resist.

An officer pulled out a yellow Taser and fired twice into Esdras’ stomach, slamming him to the pavement.

An agent forced Laynez to lie on the pavement. An officer later ordered Laynez to stand up

LAYNEZ: I am not going to get up because you are going to do to me whatever you were doing to Esdras. That is not how you arrest people.

OFFICER:  Be quiet.

LAYNEZ:  I’ve got the right to talk. I was born and raised here.

OFFICER: You have no rights here. You are a “Migo,” brother.

An officer said that Laynez’s coworker was resisting arrest, so he should be charged: “He was being a dick right now. That is why we tased.”

The agents confirmed Laynez’s mother had legal status and issued her a ticket for driving with a suspended license. Before leaving, an officer held her driver’s license to her face and tore it in half.

Although the officers were shown a picture of Laynez’ Social Security card, they arrested him. 

He was taken to the Riviera Beach facility. About four hours later, he was taken to another room. A female officer asked for his birthdate three times, although he had written it down to another officer. Then she produced a ziplocked bag with his phone, wallet and headphones.

She asked him to unlock it, adding that she needed to see if he had filmed videos of the arrest.

Laynez refused to open it and set it down on the table. The officer said they would wait until he opened it, and threatened to press charges if he didn’t unlock his phone.

But then a supervisor appeared and said that Laynez wasn’t supposed to be in that room because he is a U.S. citizen. The supervisor took Laynez’s fingerprints and said it was only to leave a record that he had been in the facility. 

Then he told Laynez he must sign some paperwork and appear in court. 

The arrest report stated that Laynez was being charged with nonviolent police obstruction. But the police report doesn’t mention that Laynez resisted. 

Laynez pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of obstruction without violence simply to get the incident over with. He entered a pretrial diversion program on June 4. The state will drop the charges on July 30 if he completes the program by then.