ICE arrested an Albuquerque man. He ended up in the hospital. Now no one knows where he is.

Yahoo

a day ago

Jesus Jose Carrero-Marquez, 30, right, and his family pose during a recent graduation celebration for their daughter at an Albuquerque school. Carrero-Marquez was hospitalized after a federal immigration law enforcement arrest May 31 in Albuquerque's South Valley. After being detained somewhere in Texas, his wife hasn't heard from him, and records show he's no longer in custody. (Photo courtesy Daniela Marina Diaz-Ortiz)
Last Saturday around 8 a.m., as she followed her husband to a mechanic in Albuquerque's South Valley, Daniela Marina Diaz-Ortiz says she and her 5-year-old daughter watched, terrified, as federal immigration agents leapt out of four SUVs and pulled her husband to the ground.
'They stopped him and took him out of the car. They didn't ask him for any identification. They didn't tell him he was under arrest or anything like that,' she told Source in Spanish in an interview outside her home Monday afternoon. 'They just pulled him out of the car, threw him on the ground, putting their feet on his back and head. At that moment, they also lifted him up by his neck and forced him into the truck.'
Jesus Jose Carrero-Marquez, 30, was hospitalized at the Presbyterian Hospital emergency room for hours, potentially due to injuries sustained in the arrest, his wife and others told Source NM.
Agents who waited outside Carrero-Marquez's room told hospital workers that the detainee was a violent gang member, according to New Mexico Rep. Eleanor Chavez (D-Albuquerque), who advocates on behalf of working conditions for healthcare workers across the state. Chavez said she learned of the arrest from a hospital worker and relayed to Source what the worker told her.
Diaz-Ortiz adamantly denied her husband is violent or a criminal or in a gang. Source's review of state and federal criminal records for Carrero-Marquez showed only a local traffic ticket in January.
Instead, Diaz-Ortiz said he is a father and husband who makes a living as a Doordash delivery driver, while seeking asylum on behalf of himself and his family after being injured in a protest against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro several years ago. The lawyer representing his appeal did not respond to requests for comment.
Diaz-Ortiz showed Source photos the family is using in its asylum appeal that show what appear to be injuries to Carrero-Marquez's leg and back, which left him with a punctured lung and a limp, she said.
Source could not determine why federal immigration authorities arrested Carrero-Marquez on May 31; why they purportedly took him to the hospital; where he is being detained; or whether he's been deported.
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A spokesperson for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to questions from Source about Carrero-Marquez's arrest, their alleged use of force or his current location. A spokesperson said the agency would respond but had not as of publication time after multiple requests. Source will update the story as necessary.
Advocates, including Chavez and immigration lawyers, have tried since May 31 to find him, including enlisting the help of U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich's office. A Heinrich spokesperson said the office had made efforts to find him but that 'ICE is not providing timely or helpful responses to our inquiries.'
A recent change to Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention policies has made it difficult to determine whether someone is in jail and, if so, at which detention center, said Sophia Genovese, a lawyer for the New Mexico Immigrant Law Center who joined efforts this week to find Carrero-Marquez.
Following his arrest, Carrero-Marquez called his wife from detention somewhere in El Paso, Diaz-Ortiz said, and described severe pain in his head and back from the arrest, she said.
The last time she spoke to him, on Sunday, her husband 'told me that they were taking him away, that he didn't know where they were going, that he hadn't seen a judge to decide whether he would be ordered to leave the country or not.'
When she hadn't heard from him again on Tuesday, Diaz-Ortiz told Source she felt certain he was gone.
'I believe my husband has already been deported,' she said, because otherwise, 'I believe he would have called me.'
On Wednesday morning, Diaz-Ortiz said she woke up after a long night of making deliveries to check ICE detention records for updates, which she's done multiple times a day since his arrest.
She discovered, and Source confirmed, he was no longer listed in custody as of Wednesday morning. And he still had not called her, she told Source.
'I still don't know anything about what happened to him,' she said.
Carrero-Marquez's arrest follows the pattern of recent ICE detentions, which leave little trail for lawyers or advocates to follow, said Genovese with the Immigration Law Center.
After being arrested and hospitalized, Carrero-Marquez called his wife from his hospital bed, she said. But hospital workers would neither confirm he was there nor allow her to see or speak with him in the emergency room, she said.
While the hospital would not confirm that Carrero-Marquez was hospitalized, a spokesperson said it has 'Do Not Announce' protocols as part of federal patient privacy regulations and that patients may be under that protocol 'for many reasons.'
The hospital staff had no choice but to cooperate with federal immigration authorities, the hospital worker told Chavez, the state representative. A spokesperson for Presbyterian told Source that, while it cannot discuss specific patients, it is legally required to cooperate with all law enforcement agencies.
'We do not have policies designed to help or hinder any law enforcement or other governmental agencies,' a spokesperson said in an emailed statement Friday.
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The officers took Carrero-Marquez to jail, likely to the Torrance County Detention Center in Estancia, Genovese said, though jail records never showed him being held there.
Diaz-Ortiz was the first person to hear from him, a few days after the arrest, when he called from El Paso, she said.
Before Wednesday, when his name disappeared completely, ICE records didn't say where he's being held, and instead only said 'Texas,' instead of a facility name and address. According to Genovese, he could have been held at either the El Paso Service Processing Center or at a nearby former Border Patrol holding facility intended for short-term use that ICE recently took over.
The ICE takeover of the holding facility has resulted in confusion and difficulty for lawyers seeking to speak to their clients. It also means no one knows where detainees are being held.
'This is like a new trend, where we're seeing a lot of people have the exact same situation where… it just says, 'Texas.' It doesn't provide a detention facility,' Genovese said.
As for why he might be in jail in the first place, Genovese said ICE agents increasingly have less discretion about detaining people who, like Carrero-Marquez, are appealing denials of asylum claims.
According to online records and a document provided by Diaz-Ortiz, a judge denied Carrero-Marquez's asylum request in February. Records also show he is appealing that denial, and that the appeal is pending.
While he has not yet received a final removal order, ICE has discretion to detain him during 'removal proceedings,' his current status., Genovese said.
That said, given the sheer number of people currently in 'removal proceedings' with pending appeals, ICE typically would not find and detain people until a final removal order is issued, Genovese said.
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ICE, 'for very real capacity reasons, given the limited number of beds nationwide and the millions of cases pending at immigration court, frequently exercised discretion in the form of releasing people on their own recognizance pending their removal proceedings,' Genovese said
But President Donald Trump's push for mass deportation has removed ICE's choice about when and where to arrest people, she said.
'It's changed now under the Trump administration, where there is a mandate, a requirement, that ICE make thousands of arrests per day,' she said. 'And they are targeting people with active removal proceedings, many of whom do not have any sort of interaction with law enforcement which would trigger mandatory detention.'
Carrero-Marquez's daughter recently celebrated graduation at a South Valley school. His wife shared a picture showing the three of them smiling, with her in a graduation gown.
Since witnessing her father's arrest, the girl is depressed, Diaz-Ortiz said, and afraid of anyone who looks like a police officer.
Diaz-Ortiz doesn't know whether ICE will come next for her or her daughter, whether she should enroll her daughter back in school or what to do next. But she still has to work.
On Tuesday, she took her daughter along with her as she made deliveries for DoorDash, she said, suddenly the sole caregiver and sole income earner in her family.
Amid the confusion and uncertainty about her husband's whereabouts, Diaz-Ortiz said she is terrified about the prospect of him being deported back to Venezuela due to his injuries and the government's repressive policies.
'In Venezuela you can't speak freely or say what you want because they attack you,' she said. 'We came here for a better future.'
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