Latest news with #JosedeJesusOrtega
USA Today
4 days ago
- USA Today
Surgery center workers who scuffled with ICE agents facing federal charges
ICE agents are facing increasing pushback from community members as they ramp up deportation efforts. This time, the resisters were arrested. Two California surgery center workers are facing federal charges after being accused of scuffling with ICE agents. The July 9 incident captured on video shows the two workers standing in the way of agents, as they tried to detain a man who ran into the surgical building. To identify the workers, federal agents staked out the Los Angeles-area SCA Health Ontario Advanced Surgery Center for three days following the July 8 confrontation, in which masked, plainclothes ICE agents chased a suspected illegal immigrant into the building. Federal officials on July 25 said Jose de Jesus Ortega and Danielle Davila have been charged with assaulting a federal officer and conspiracy to prevent by force and intimidation a federal officer from discharging his duties. Ortega was arrested on July 25, and authorities said they're still pursuing Davila. The video, which went viral, shows two surgery center workers in scrubs yelling and blocking one of the agents from detaining the man. Federal officials criticized what they said was a "false narrative" in the media and online that portrayed the detainee as a patient at the clinic. According to authorities, the ICE agents saw the truck stop outside the building, and when they approached the men, the men ran. According to court records, the agents had no specific knowledge that the man who ran into the clinic was living in the country illegally, and had been following the truck in which he was riding as part of a "roving patrol" in their unmarked vehicle. "The illegal alien arrested inside the surgery center was not a patient," United States Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement. "He ran inside for cover and these defendants attempted to block his apprehension by assaulting our agents. It doesn't matter who you are or where you work, if you assault our agents or otherwise interfere with our operations, you will be arrested and charged with a federal crime." In a July 9 social media post, Homeland Security officials said the man who agents were chasing is Honduran national Denis Guillen-Solis. They said he was living illegally in the United States. "He ended up near the Ontario Advanced Surgical Center where hospital staff assaulted law enforcement and drug the officer and illegal alien into the facility," DHS said in the post. "Then, the staff attempted to obstruct the arrest by locking the door, blocking law enforcement vehicles from moving, and even called the cops claiming there was a 'kidnapping.'" The video is among the latest examples of people delaying or obstructing ICE agents carrying out President Donald Trump's mass-immigration initiative, which has also sparked widespread protests. The identities of the two ICE agents involved in the surgery center detention were not released. Federal officials say ICE agents are increasingly being assaulted or targeted by community members, which requires them to remain anonymous.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Yahoo
Feds charge SoCal medical workers with interfering in ICE raid
Two staff members from an Ontario surgery center have been charged with allegedly interfering with U.S. immigration officers trying to detain landscapers who ran into the center to escape. Jose de Jesus Ortega, a 38-year-old Highland resident, was arrested Friday morning and is expected to appear in U.S. District Court in Riverside, according to a U.S. attorney's office Central District of California news release. Officials are still looking for the other suspect, Danielle Nadine Davila, 33, of Corona. Both are charged with assaulting a federal officer and conspiracy to prevent by force and intimidation a federal officer from discharging his duties, authorities said. According to video obtained by KTLA-TV, staffers at the Ontario Advanced Surgical Center earlier this month told two agents to leave because they didn't have a warrant to go onto the property. The agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement were trying to detain 30-year-old Denis Guillen-Solis and two other landscapers who had been working outside and ran into the surgical center when the agents showed up. In the video, Guillen-Solis is shown holding onto the doorway at the surgical center and asking the agents to present identification. The agents then pulled Guillen-Solis from the doorway and detained him. 'The illegal alien arrested inside the surgery center was not a patient. He ran inside for cover and these defendants attempted to block his apprehension by assaulting our agents," said U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli in a statement. According to an affidavit, the two ICE agents wore government-issued equipment, including vests and were using unmarked government-operated vehicles when they conducted their operations. The agents followed a truck with three men inside and approached them after the men exited the truck in the parking lot of the surgery center, according to the release. Two of the men ran away and one of them, an alleged undocumented immigrant from Honduras, was detained near the surgery center's front entrance and tried to pull away, causing the ICE officer to fall to the ground. A medical staffer helped the man off the ground and pulled him away from the officer, according to the news release. The man went into the surgery center and was chased by the ICE agent, who eventually stopped him. The incident occurred amid an extraordinary immigration enforcement effort by the Trump administration in Southern California. Thousands of unauthorized immigrants — many without a criminal record — have been detained at work, in courthouses and on public streets going about their day. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Daily Mail
4 days ago
- Daily Mail
California medics block ICE agents from arresting migrant
The California medics who tried to stop ICE agents from arresting an undocumented migrant who ran into a surgical center have been federally charged over the incident. Jose de Jesus Ortega, 38, and Danielle Nadine Davila, 33, were charged with assaulting, resisting, or impeding federal agents, according to the Justice Department. Ortega (pictured) was arrested Friday morning and Davila remains wanted as police look for her. Denis Guillen-Solis, 30, had been landscaping outside the Ontario Advanced Surgery Center in Ontario, California, when ICE agents tried to approach him as they conducted roving immigration-related operations. Upon noticing the officers, Guillen-Solis, from Honduras, attempted to flee, running into the medical facility in search of safety. The federal immigration agents then followed him inside, where a tense and chaotic scene unfolded. In a clip of the altercation that has spread on social media, the medical staff in blue scrubs are heard telling an armed ICE agent wearing a mask and bulletproof vest to let go of the man, who is crying and gasping for breath. 'Get your hands off of him. You don't even have a warrant,' says one staff member, shielding the man from an immigration agent. 'Let him go. You need to get out.' United States Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement Friday: 'This story is another example of a false narrative echoed in the media in furtherance of an agenda to delegitimize federal agents. 'The illegal alien arrested inside the surgery center was not a patient. He ran inside for cover and these defendants attempted to block his apprehension by assaulting our agents. 'It doesn't matter who you are or where you work, if you assault our agents or otherwise interfere with our operations, you will be arrested and charged with a federal crime.' If convicted, the medical workers could face a statutory maximum sentence of eight years in federal prison on the assault count and up to six years in federal prison on the conspiracy count. The Department of Homeland Security posted on X that officers in Ontario were conducting a targeted operation to arrest two men who were in the country illegally when one of the men, identified as a 30-year-old from Honduras, fled on foot. The department said the surgery center staff 'assaulted law enforcement' and attempted to obstruct the arrest. Javier Hernandez, executive director of the Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice, said agents eventually arrested the Honduran man, and advocates do not know where he is. He was sending money to Honduras to help his mother with her dialysis treatments, Hernandez said. He said he doubts it was a targeted operation as ICE claims because agents also questioned two co-workers until learning they both had legal status, one as a US citizen and the other as a permanent resident.
