Rally planned for Fresno father arrested by ICE on way to drop off kids at school
Hugo Hernandez was welcomed by colorful balloons and bright Silly String during a surprise gathering Friday afternoon — a day after he was released on bond by an immigration judge.
The Fresno father of four had been at the Mesa Verde Detention Center in California for the past month after he was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in November while on his way to drop off his children at school.
His 15-year-old daughter Sandra Hernandez captured the incident with her cell phone camera.
“One thing that we do know is that (the family) pulled over because they thought it was a traffic stop,” said Ariana Martinez-Lott, a Fresno organizer with Faith in the Valley.
Hernandez is originally from Mexico and has lived in the Fresno area for more than a decade.
April Grant, a spokeswoman for ICE, said back in early November that she wouldn’t be able to comment on why Hernandez was detained without an Alien number, which is assigned to the detained individual by federal authorities, or Hernandez’s date of birth.
In addition, Hugo Hernandez was not available to comment Friday regarding the reasons why ICE was seeking his arrest.
At least 10 other people say they have been pulled over by ICE in the Fresno area in the past year and a half, Martinez-Lott said.
Paige Hughes, ICE spokesperson, sent an email to The Fresno Bee on Thursday denying the allegations made by activists like Martinez-Lott, in terms of ICE making traffic stops. “This allegation is simply not true. We simply do not conduct indiscriminate traffic stops as all of our enforcement actions are targeted. Rumors, like this, only cause fear and misinformation in the communities we work to protect,” Hughes wrote.
This allegation is simply not true. We simply do not conduct indiscriminate traffic stops as all of our enforcement actions are targeted. Rumors, like this, only cause fear and misinformation in the communities we work to protect.
“This allegation is simply not true. We simply do not conduct indiscriminate traffic stops as all of our enforcement actions are targeted. Rumors, like this, only cause fear and misinformation in the communities we work to protect.”
In the wake of the latest case involving Hernandez, his children and various community organizations, including Faith in the Valley, will take part in a march in Fresno on Saturday.
The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Northern California, who has members participating in Saturday’s event, said in a news release the march is to bring attention to “ICE’s continuing illegal practice of misleading immigrants into thinking they are the police.”
The event is scheduled from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the St. Paul Catholic Newman Center.
Were rights violated?
Martinez-Lott said in Hernandez’s case, immigration agents didn’t respect his constitutional rights. Federal agents entered his vehicle without his permission and forced him out.
Activists are “demanding that immigration stop pulling people over to arrest them because it just creates fear, and it creates an unhealthy community when the community can’t trust the police because they think it’s immigration,” Martinez-Lott said.
Additionally, ICE “refused to tell Hernandez why he was stopped and ignored his request to remain silent, violating his constitutional rights,” according to the ACLU
“They threatened to Tase Hernandez if he didn’t exit his vehicle and to call Child Protective Services to take his children if they didn’t contact their mother to come get them,” the ACLU says.
Hernandez and his wife were not ready to give interviews Friday, Martinez-Lott said.
His daughter Sandra said the family didn’t know if her dad was ever going to come back home.
“I stopped going to school because I just wasn’t ready because it was something traumatizing to see how your dad got taken away, on his way to dropping you off,” she said, “... and seeing how me and my older brother weren’t able to do nothing about it.”
But now Sandra and her older brother Eduardo, 16, have created You 4 Change (Young Organizers United for Change), which aims to provide financial help to detained individuals who have no family members to provide support for them.
The community was there for them, and they want to give back, they said.
“We want to stand up for Latinos ... they don’t have to be alone,” she said. “We are going to stand up and we are going to keep on fighting until we see a change, until we see the laws change. The march that we are having, it’s just the beginning of what we are going to do.”
Hernandez was released on bond Thursday, and his case will continue to move through immigration court, “under the threat of deportation,” according to the ACLU.
He is being represented pro bono by an attorney.
This story was originally published December 13, 2019 at 7:18 PM.
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