ICE Has Reportedly Mistakenly Arrested and Released Hundreds of American Citizens
A new investigation published Friday by the Los Angeles Times found that since 2012, 1,480 people have been arrested—and later released—from Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody after it was revealed they were actually American citizens. Cases of mistaken identity might just be a data point for ICE, but as the Times piece reveals, they upend people’s lives in ways that range from distressing to outright cruel.
One man, Davino Watson, was held in ICE custody for three-and-a-half years because agents had identified the wrong person as his father. According to the newspaper, even after the agency realized its error, federal lawyers “seized on a new U.S. reading of Jamaican law to argue Watson should be deported because his father was not his legal guardian when they left the island nation.” It was only after Watson’s appeal made it to U.S. District Court that he was eventually freed.
“You feel like your rights are stripped from you. You feel hopeless. It was very hard to understand. I spent many nights crying,” Watson told the Times.