U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents held a 5-year-old girl hostage while ICE agents tried to arrest her father, Edward Hip Mejia, in Leominster, Massachusetts, reports NBC News.
A video provided to Telemundo Nueva Inglaterra shows the girl sitting beside an SUV with three agents outside her home: The ICE agents refused to allow the child into her home.
“They took my daughter, she’s 5 years old. She has autism spectrum,” the girl’s mother is heard telling agents in the video. “Give me my daughter back.”
“Is that your daughter? Come here so I can see those IDs,” a man who appears to be an immigration agent can be heard saying in the video.
“Hey, I can give it through the door,” Mejia is heard saying in response.
The agent then points to the ground in front of himself and tells Mejia he can give the ID to him “right here.”
Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin falsely claimed “Officers helped rescue the child and called local police to report the abandonment.”
The police never charged the parents with “abandonment,” and returned the child to her parents, which ICE agents refused to do, notes NBC Boston.
ICE Agents went back to the home two days later and detained Mejia, his wife said. He is being held at an ICE detention center in Plymouth, she said.
(Sources: NBC Boston, NBC News)